


when I wake up I'm afraid (somebody else might take my place)

by butcherbirdie



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Anxiety, But the vocab and language is there and I'm not using euphemisms so, Childbirth info overload, Daddy Kink, F/M, I refuse to say they're graphic because it's a bodily function, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Look we all have needs, Modern Character in Thedas, Modern Girl in Thedas, Pre-Relationship, There will be talk of pereniums soz not soz, descriptions of childbirth, implied/referenced eating disorder, inaccurate fantasy coffee substitutes, this is your warning, well...sorta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 10:20:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29856621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butcherbirdie/pseuds/butcherbirdie
Summary: Adrian and Thea, swept from their world into Thedas to bear the shared brunt of a Mark gone wrong. Two Inquisitors against an unfamiliar world, amidst mounting religious tension and the call for an Inquisition to save the world.In this episode? Thea stresses; dodges the resident ghost boy; and performs Leopold's maneuvers.
Relationships: Blackwall/Female Inquisitor, Female Inquisitor/The Iron Bull
Comments: 8
Kudos: 11
Collections: Two Inquisitors One Brain Cell





	1. the wave

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is another "Modern Character as Inquisitor" work except there's two of 'em. They're chaotic. They share a braincell on the best of days. And they're wreaking havoc. I figured writing anachronistic snippets would be better than starting from the beginning, where I would inevitably burn out and not continue. We do what we can!
> 
> This takes place after Haven at Skyhold, but prior to any big revelations about Blackwall. 
> 
> Thea uses she/her pronouns and Adrian uses they/them. 
> 
> I'm deviating a bit from canon because I refuse to believe the whole of Inquisition took place within a year. I refuse. The Hinterlands ALONE would - you know what? No. I refuse.

The problem was, Thea thinks to herself as she hauls hot water off the fire and transfers it to a basin, is that it comes in _waves_.

Follows a pattern, really – her and Adrian have been making slow and steady progress across the continent, clearing pulsing red lyrium nests, amassing resources, leaving the communities they pass through a little less fearful (at least) and a little more prepared (at best). Along the way, the Inquisition’s reputation establishes itself through its deeds.

Well, that’s what Thea likes to _think_ – she’s an “actions speak for themselves” kind of gal. Realistically, she realizes there’s a million players behind the scenes. From Josephine’s tireless correspondences, Varric’s populist writings…even Vivienne’s subtle pulling of Orlesian strings have all come together to bolster the Inquisition’s reputation far beyond what her and Adrian could accomplish with just two glowy hands.

 _The dirty work of closing rifts does not alone a good story make_ , Varric would say – or some bullshit like that.

Almost two years into this mess and Thea feels wholly changed from the woman that rolled out of that wrecked temple. Her hair – already dark, thick and curly – had gotten even more unmanageable once it got past her shoulders. At one point Adrian had helped take a knife to the split ends, but now Thea was seriously considering chopping it all off. Keeping it in a braid was the only way to deal with it, and she rarely wore it down. Months of outdoor work and long days on the road had transformed her body from its pre-Thedas sedentary slouch, but she was nowhere near the prowess and power of their other companions.

With broad shoulders and a wider ribcage, Thea very much preferred long-range weapons (had, in fact, wheedled at Sera until she taught her a few tricks) and she tried to pretend that the improvement on her shoulder strength made up for the fact that even after all this time in Thedas, after being put through all that training and the bullshit at Haven, she still couldn’t touch her toes let alone perform any acrobatic feats on the battlefield.

(“If you consistently practiced, you might be able to by now,” Adrian had sighed at her, watching her on the floor of their common quarters using a rolled up blanket slung around her foot to help her stretch.

Thea, who usually spent much of her free time at the tavern and avoided any excessive activity that made her physically uncomfortable, decided not to argue).

Still, Thea doesn’t get too hung up about it – her presence on the battlefield is not for her raw talent. She had come to terms long ago that her responsibility was to learn enough to stay alive and not put herself in stupid situations until her and Adrian could get close enough to use their Marks to close the rifts.

Speaking of…shifting the basin to her hip, Thea glances down at the offending “glowy hand”.

She usually wears a leather glove over it when she’s out and about in Skyhold. It’s not for a disguise, because she can still see the sick pulse of green under the cuff if she looks hard enough – it's because truthfully, when she touches things with it (food, cloth, the shaft of a bow, the skin of someone’s face…) it’s like a staticky friction-rub, like goosebumps on her palm, a funny bone hit tremoring up her fingers.

It’s _bearable_ –

( _everything is bearable after Haven, when she felt like she was going to scream right out of her own head from the pain and the fear_ )

( _everything is bearable after the sick clawing panic of watching Adrian ride through a withdrawal Thea was half-convinced would kill them; sitting, trembling with fear next to the cot, waiting for her friend’s breathing to stop in the night_ )

– but it’s certainly not her favourite feeling in the world and the glove helps.

Anyways. Waves. With each new foothold in the countryside acquired comes new supplies. New contacts. New military assets for Rutherford to drool over in that stuffy war room.

And. More refugees.

Returning to Skyhold after a scouting expedition means Thea has to strip her armor and fall into bed immediately in order to recover because in a few days there's usually a new wave of people arriving at Skyhold to be close to the Inquisition.

At least for the beginning of one of these waves, they often need to move the worst of the sick and wounded to the barn, where cots are hastily shoved up against the inside walls, leaving most of the middle free for supplies and work areas for the healers.

As she enters the barn Thea feels, as always, a little out of her depth – most of the clinic volunteers are mages, recruited from Redcliffe, who previously studied healing arts. Her clumsy suturing and cobbled together herbal knowledge really pales in comparison to a guy who can seal up someone’s gut wound with a flick of his hand (unfair, she chides herself, she _knows_ it takes effort).

Passing under the stairs that lead to the loft above, Thea takes a quick peek up through the slats. She can’t see Blackwall moving about, he must be somewhere else. He’d been fine with moving the sick beds into the barn, and to his credit she doesn’t think he sleeps elsewhere during this time, stays in the loft despite the fact that many of the patients toss and turn and rarely sleep through the night due to their pain.

He had been quite sly about it when she first broached the “barn appropriation” subject, Thea remembers.

“Well, if the Inquisition needs its barn back, they should feel free to do so.”

She had squinted at him, then pointed out, “It’s not even _our_ barn. It’s the _mysterious-castle-we-found-in-the-mountains_ ’ barn. If you don’t want us using the barn, we’ll find somewhere else. I don’t want to encroach on your space.”

“You’re the Inquisitor – you don’t encroach, you command.”

He had been teasing, but it had been another, constant reminder to Thea that this wasn’t (and could never be) simply “a job” whose uniform she could slip off at the end of the day.

That was always her problem, she thought to herself, scowling as she set the basin down and laid out rags in preparation for the temperature becoming tolerable. The _decorum_.

Here was the thing she liked about her and Adrian. They _worked_ well together, not like puzzle pieces needing the other but more like two planets in a rotation axis whose overlapping presence supported and enhanced each other. Adrian could go where Thea couldn’t – could make room, make waves, make their presence known and respected amongst the people they’d been tasked with working with. Adrian was honest, they were steadfastly direct, and they could access inroads that Thea just wasn’t brave enough to. Thea was never good at that shit, could never quite master the sincerity and effort that Adrian tossed into everything in their life.

But.

Adrian could build rapport while Thea could monitor and solidify it, be a little more slippery, a little more behind the scenes. Could help support Adrian in the areas they expressed distaste for – the politics, the two-facedness, the placid acceptance of an Orlesian insult, and the ability to return one in kind under the guise of an enthusiastic compliment.

Not that Adrian couldn’t do it, Thea reasoned, but this way Adrian could focus on where their talents lay, could trust Thea to run those axillary niceties – especially on the days when Adrian needed an extra breath or two before war room reports.

Love is a stupid thing – Thea loves Adrian, always has, will peel the tendons out of anyone who tries to shoot down the person who has become the brightest star in this horrifically unfamiliar galaxy for her; and she’ll cut herself off at the knees before she ever purposely makes Adrian feel like she’s coddling or pitying them - her support does NOT mean she thinks less of Adrian's abilities. Love is a stupid thing, but Thea will be a fool when it comes to Adrian.

Here though, with the smell of infection and her sleeves rolled up above her elbows, is the closest Thea can come to invisible - and invisibility is a _hell_ of a respite. Most of their patients are exhausted, miserable, grumpy, starving; they don’t give a shit if Andraste’s whole head comes out of Thea’s palm, as long as they can get some relief. Over the time she’s been here, Thea’s mastered the basics of healing salves and tonics and that honestly seems to do the trick for most travelers, who are suffering from some combination of shell-shock, dehydration, fatigue and just general, you know, ‘the world’s been torn apart’-itis.

“The world’s been torn apart-itis.” The mage on her left repeats, with a blank expression. His name is Tomas, one of the more reliable volunteers who seems to have a real shine for the healing arts. She realizes she’s said it out loud.

“I’m considering making it an official diagnosis.” She murmurs to hide her embarrassment – it doesn’t work because Tomas snorts. He’s her age (late twenties, stocky Ferelden build), hadn’t seen the outside of the Circle walls since he was nine, and she watched him put someone’s guts back into their torso last week so she considers him good sort and allows him to laugh at her expense.

Rarely – but not as rarely as Thea would like – there are people in need of amputation, heavy healing (she leaves that to the mages); but usually by the time they get up into the mountains whatever trauma was inflicted on them is days or weeks old and the biggest concern is infection from whatever crude job had to be done to the wound on the road. Right now though, they’re coming off the tail end of a wave, and most of the people left in the barn are those with fevers, exhaustion, and some poorly-set limbs – those who need a bit of respite and monitoring still before they have to be jostled around in the multitudes of tents and buildings erected on Skyhold grounds to house everyone.

Thea busies herself for a few hours making sure there’s enough hot water for those waking up to clean themselves off with; and in the late morning she has to make a run to the garden, where they’ve got a storeroom of drying herbs (the garden itself is mostly medicinal, though the herbalists can pry the row of sunflowers against the southern wall from her cold dead hands!) that can be easily incorporated into another batch of healing potions.

Along the way, she tries to keep an eye out for Adrian. There are days where they don’t see each other, each pulled into a daily orbit that doesn’t intersect save for meals (and even then…). Their ritual of slipping notes under each others’ doors – a habit from the before times, when their cellphones connected them across the city (and, at times, across the country) – helps give each other an idea of what the other was up to.

This morning, when Thea had dressed and been ready to leave her quarters, she’d found a note under her door that read (in Adrian’s loose, sloping handwriting) ‘ _I HAVE AN IDEA , will tell you at dinner’_, which really didn’t help narrow down where Adrian could be. She didn’t knock at Adrian’s door in case they had gone back to sleep before starting the day, just slipped her own note under and proceeded down to the courtyard.

If she had to guess, Adrian might have gotten caught up in the forge – they do that, from time to time, gets a modification in their head after speaking with Solas or Cassandra or Varric that _has_ to come out or they'll lose it, and it’s only because Harritt is one of the few people who Adrian will listen to that Thea's not heading to the forge now to make sure Adrian’s eaten. Adrian respects the blacksmith and he’s just the right measure of wary respectfulness and gruff no-nonsense that if he tells them to take a break, they actually _will_.

It’s hard, not to worry. Thea worries a lot, but when there are five hundred other things to worry about sometimes it’s easier to just let things go – and, sometimes her worry over Adrian turns into something a bit too suffocating and overbearing for her friend to deal with.

The morning goes quickly by the time all the busy tasks are accomplished, and she’s embarrassed that it takes her longer than expected to notice him. She’s straightening up, having just helped a patient put his legs into his trousers, when she catches sight of Cole crouching by the small firepit in the centre of the barn.

 _Fuck me_ , she thinks, quickly casting her glance around the barn. She’s seen pretty much every patient this morning and aside from a few still delirious with fever, no one is at death’s door by any means!

She settles, finally, for ignoring him and hopes he’s gone the next time she looks at him.

It’s not that she doesn’t _like_ Cole – he's sweet in a terrifyingly alien way and she certainly doesn’t treat him with the same disdain that Vivienne and Sera do – it’s just. Her first impression of him had gone sideways fast and he can’t take a hint, has continued to speak to her and hover around her despite her discomfort.

Adrian likes him, which – well, they _would_ , but both Inquisitors are wary of the things that tend to come out of his mouth. In a place where they’ve felt off kilter for so long, owing to their origins and the general mess of the Temple of Sacred Ashes, adding Cole’s proclivity for exposing someone’s inner thoughts could be a dangerous mix.

“You have to be direct,” Adrian had told her when Thea had come back to their shared sitting area after the first mortifying encounter with Cole, ears burning. “He’s incapable of taking hints, but people still keep trying to talk to him like he’s lived his whole life here. Tell him “stop”.”

“If I tell him “stop” he just asks “why”!” Thea had bemoaned, collapsing into a chair by the fire and reaching under it for the whiskey bottle Blackwall had passed along to her from the storeroom. Adrian had eyed the bottle with trepidation.

“Tell him you don’t like when he says those things without your permission.”

Adrian makes it seem so easy, but Thea has trouble with it – has trouble with directness, prefers to slink her way around issues and make sure they’re smoothed over. Adrian’s direct by nature, but will (momentarily) adapt to Thea’s need for speak-around if she really needs it.

(“That’s called _humoring_ you, Thea.” Adrian had pointed out. “And I’m only willing to do it once in a while.”)

But Cole has zero experience with talking to people and hasn’t yet responded to Dorian’s pointed suggestions or Varric’s friendly attempts to teach Cole about what people do and don’t like.

As Thea moves around the barn (purposely keeping away from the firepit) she keeps seeing him. He’s not really moving, and no one else seems to be noticing him. Either they’re too busy to care about another addition to the clinic, or Cole’s doing that thing where people’s eyes pass right over him.

She gets caught up in gathering rags and linens and getting them accumulated into the big washing basins that sit outside the barn – there’s a concoction she gets from the servants, a syrupy “detergent” of what she assumes is lye (fantasy lye? There are so many things Thea wonders about, and her knowledge of medieval technology only gets her so far without Google references) that she can soak the more…fluid-stained materials before moving them inside for the washing. The solution makes her knuckles crack and bleed after prolonged exposure, makes them sting when they hit the air, so she tries to keep her hands submerged as much as possible until she’s finished.

So when Cole speaks, she’s forearm deep in a basin and nearly pitches forward into it out of surprise. She had been lost in thinking about the garden and wondering if the elfroot had gone to seed while she was away.

“It’s quiet.”

“Oh jeez, hey.” She looks over her shoulder at Cole – he’s not quite looking at her, is gazing back at the barn.

When he doesn’t reply, she adds thoughtfully, “Yes, it is. I suppose that's a good thing. Fewer people needing treatment."

"You don't like when it's quiet." Cole tells her. "Things slip in."

Thea narrows her eyes - the last time her and Cole had had a conversation that lasted more than a few seconds, the spirit had asked her a question about her father, leading Thea to a rather embarrassing outburst in the middle of the tavern that had culminated in her slinking back to her room, thoroughly perturbed by Cole's ability to swim around in her - apparently broadcastable! - thoughts.

("Does that to everyone," Sera had spit later, having witnessed the whole thing. "Creepy little shit, isn't he?")

Luckily, they seem to be alone for the moment - if Cole has anything more to say about her innermost fears at least she'll be the only one hearing it!

"You know me, Cole." she keeps her tone light. "I'm a real thrill-seeker."

"No." the spirit tilts his head. "When things are quiet you start to think. You like to be busy, to let them fade away. Those thoughts."

"I think everyone likes to be busy, hey, speaking of, I think Solas was looking for you." Thea hurries with pushing the mass of linens deeper into the basin, not liking the way Cole is looking - thoughtful, like he's about to recite a deep personal insecurity back to her.

“Inquisitor,” Cole says slowly. “You and Warden Blackwall are not related.”

“…No.” she replies, narrowing her eyes at him. “We’re not.”

Cole is silent for a beat too long and she starts running it through her head. Does he think they’re related because they both have dark hair? She certainly doesn’t think they _act_ the same – Blackwall is a little more solemn than her, is able to be both thoughtfully silent and yet incredibly magnetizing when he’s in his element, letting out a belly laugh in the tavern when Sera says something wickedly amusing; or booming out genuine compliments to their companions after a rough battle, voice easily heard even when they’ve spread out to cut down shades…

“Watching, wondering,” Cole starts to murmur, and she gets a bad feeling in her gut. “If I could only put my hands on him I could feel his heartbeat under my fingers and _know_ he’s _real_ – ”

“Cole, I’m really not liking where this is going…” she warns, feeling a lump in her throat.

“You are not related.” He repeats, wondering, “But sometimes you call him – ”

 _“Cole, STOP!”_ she shrieks, mortified; her tone was loud enough to cover the sound of his voice but she can still see his lips shape the word and oh my _God_ she will pay someone her weight in gold if she can avoid ever hearing lanky, pale-eyed, thousand-yard-stare Cole say the word “daddy”.

“It’s a joke!” she wails – and it _is_ , usually, a way to rile Adrian up when they’re alone and Thea’s espousing how unfortunately attractive Blackwall is. They used to joke about that shit all the time before Thedas, so calling Blackwall “Daddy” had spiraled from a joke designed to make Adrian snort ale through their nose into a half-serious lament when she’s caught Blackwall doing something unintentionally attractive.

“I refuse to believe,” she had told Adrian one afternoon, tipsy enough on wine that she’s given up on the pile of documents that lay strewn across the desk they share, “That anyone chops wood shirtless in the middle of a courtyard. I refuse. He’s a romance novel stereotype.”

“He’s a stereotype of _something_ , all right.” Had been Adrian’s snorting reply.

She’s mustering up all her courage, all her conversations with Adrian, to tell Cole off because he still looks like he wants to pursue this line of questioning, when –

“Am I interrupting something?” Blackwall’s amused voice comes up behind them and Thea finally lifts her hands out of the water with genuine alarm, spinning around as she dries them on her apron.

“Absolutely not.” She affirms. “Hello. Hi.”

Cole hums flatly – as she stands, she asks the spirit, “Do you think you could load this basin to go to the laundresses?”

She’s seen Cole help out around the castle before, and it’s a small mercy that he doesn’t say anything, just bends and starts to maneuver the basin over to the cart they use to transport supplies.

It takes Thea a moment to realize Blackwall’s not alone – he’s without his armour, as is usual for him within the walls of Skyhold, just his gambeson instead of his added breastplate. Right now, his face is relaxed and open and he has his arm around someone – a woman, young, a little road-lean. She’s human and has a pretty face, and for a moment Thea gets a sour, prickly taste in her mouth.

Then, as Blackwall says, “There’s someone who wants to meet you, Inquisitor” she follows the woman’s arm down to where it’s cupped around her belly, clearly in the later trimester of pregnancy.

 _Oh_.

“Oh boy.” Thea says, weakly.

She’d mentioned, briefly to the Inner Circle, about her education prior to Thedas. She’d been in the later stages of training to be a midwife, but this was a different world than the one she had left. No ultrasounds, no Dopplers, no blood tests, no hospitals with surgical staff – she hadn’t felt confident at the best of times in school, let alone in Thedas, and although she’d mentioned it she’d _never_ voiced any interest in helping deliver babies here. Fortunately for her, she was here to seal rifts, not catch babies – there were pregnant people on the road, obviously, but she spent most of her time out in the field when her and Adrian went on scouting missions; and for a long time both Haven and Skyhold were full of mainly military recruits and religious devotees. Very few of them (if any!) had been pregnant.

“I’m Leda, your Worship.” Says the woman, and drops into a clumsy curtsy. She’s dressed in simple traveling clothes and her hair is a dull ginger in the light.

“Oh boy,” Thea says again, laughs. “The “Worship” thing is highly unnecessary, Leda. I’m Thea. How, um – congratulations, how far along are you?”

“Nearly nine lunar cycles, Your Worsh – Lady Thea.”

“Oh, I hate that too, Thea’s fine.” Thea waves a hand at her. “It must have been a long journey here for you, are you well?”

“Aye, I was lucky that my travel companions took good care of me.” With a shy look at Blackwall beside her, she continues, “Warden Blackwall was speaking with my husband earlier, and when he mentioned that I hadn’t seen a midwife since we fled our village, Warden Blackwall told us that you may be able to help.”

“ _Did_ he?” Thea shoots a look at Blackwall, whose eyes crinkle in amusement under her stare.

“I make no promises for the Lady Inquisitor, or she’ll have my head,” he tells Leda, who’s looking between them with hesitancy. “But I thought perhaps she would be willing to look you over, put your mind at ease about your child’s health.”

 _There are no ultrasounds here_ , she wants to rail at Blackwall, who’s talking as if she had been a practicing midwife when she had never been truly alone with a client in her _life_. _What am I supposed to tell her_?

She's itching already for something to drink - or something to fiddle with, keep her hands busy as that nervous feeling mounts.

“Please, come and sit inside,” Thea extends a hand to Leda. “I – we can speak there. Have you been feeling baby moving?”

“Oh, yes, he’s kicking up a storm.” Leda’s hand travels over her belly as they walk into the barn. “Barely lets his momma sleep.”

“You think he’s a boy?” Thea asks, surprised.

“My mother – ” Leda pauses, looks a little sad. “My mother said boys always sit lower. And I sure do feel him in my back!”

Thea forgets, sometimes, how hard this war, this upset has been on everyone. Blackwall trails a respectful distance behind them but she can see the acknowledgement of Leda’s statement in his eyes as well.

Dammit. He’s a chivalrous idiot. She has no doubt that half a sob story was all it took for Blackwall to suggest her “services”.

Leda is healthy, if not a little fatigued from the journey. Her husband, a carpenter by trade, had already set about procuring them a tent and the Skyhold rations had increased substantially since Haven. This is their first child – two years ago Leda hadn’t yet felt quickening before she had been laid flat with painful cramps and the passing of blood and clots. She spoke with sadness about the loss but comforted herself with the rhythmic rubbing of her belly.

Thea has her lie on the cot, warms her hands between each other before coaxing the woman to raise her dress (lying a blanket across her thighs for modesty) so she can try to palpate her belly.

Throughout it all, Blackwall remains in the background – doesn’t make any remarks, just leans against the pillar or does busywork behind them. They’ve pushed his woodworking station temporarily to the side for all the cots so she can hear him puttering around over there as they speak.

The anxious feeling in Thea’s stomach starts as soon as she starts palpating. Not that palpation is an entirely accurate art, but especially in the third trimester (dependent on baby’s position), there are some parts that stick out clear as day.

“Where do you feel the movements, mostly?” Thea asks Leda, trying to keep her voice steady while her hands move down the sides of the woman’s body.

Leda motions carelessly towards her right hip.

“I felt like he used to turn all the time,” she giggles, unaware that Thea is sweating a little. “But now it’s always the same place. It’s making me feel quite sore.”

“That’s babies for you,” Thea straightens up with a strained laugh, cups her hand above Leda’s pubic bone and warns, “This might feel a little uncomfortable. Deep breath in for me? A-a-and…out.”

As Leda exhales, Thea pushes her cupped hand deep against Leda’s belly and delicately wriggles the part of the baby she finds.

Fuck. Okay. Thea deliberates, sitting back on her heels after helping Leda sit up.

“I get called away from Skyhold often,” she warns the woman, looking up at her face. “And my midwifery training back home was…not as extensive as I would have hoped.”

Leda shakes her head, face sunny.

“My sister and cousin are with us,” she explains. “And my sister has given birth before. She will attend me.”

Thea nods, then says, “I – don’t mean to alarm. But if you go into labour, will you please send for me? If I am not here, it can’t be helped, but if possible I’d like to be there, even if all I do is bring hot water and let your sister and cousin be by your side.”

“Of course, my lady.” Now Leda looks a little fretful. “Is everything alright?”

Thea tamps down on the urge to scream, and says instead, “You seem healthy, and feeling baby kicking is a good way to keep an eye on them. Let me…hm. Let me speak with you tomorrow, alright?”

Leda still looks worried, and with a wince Thea assures, “Please don’t worry. I get nervous, I always have been. And since I’m always nervous, sometimes I keep a close eye on things even if it seems silly to. Are you alright if I check in on you once in a while? Meet your sister, maybe? Just put my mind at ease?”

Leda nods at this, enthuses, “I’m sure she’ll be thrilled to meet one of Andraste’s blessed ones!”

She’d take “Your Worship” over “Andraste’s blessed one” any day – nonetheless, Thea forces a smile.

“I’ll be thrilled to meet her. Congratulations again, Leda. I hope you keep well and rest up to meet your little guy.”

“Thank you for speaking with me.” Thea gives Leda a hand up and Leda pauses briefly to speak to Blackwall before she’s leaving the barn.

Thea straightens up the blankets on the cot just to give her hands something to do – her mind is racing and not for the first time she bemoans the loss of _Internet resources_.

"All well, I take it?" Blackwall's voice comes up behind her and Thea tries to wipe the frustrated scowl off her face before she turns.

"Bringing me more work, Warden Blackwall?" she tries instead, tilting her head as he comes up to stand in front of her. "Have I been stingy with my rift-closing lately?"

"I would never, your Ladyship." Blackwall knows she hates the formalities, but the titles never sound stiff under his tongue. In fact, Thea would hate to admit that it sends a thrill through her. No one else can make "Ladyship" sound attractively rough like Blackwall can. "Merely leaning on your...wealth of knowledge."

Wealth of knowledge! _Ha_. Like Blackwall would say that if he'd seen her in her third year of midwifery, running around all panicky in her scrubs!

(Well. He has seen her run around panicky, but she was wearing a leather cuirass which looks a _lot_ cooler).

“Your Ladyship seems to be under the impression that I am out collecting patients for you,” Blackwall’s still looking at her, an amused smile tucked under his beard. Thea levels him with a look and he finishes, “Allow me to buy you a drink, as thanks. And an apology, for the intrusion.”

A drink sounds _very_ good, now that Thea’s aware that there’s someone in the castle approaching their due date and no one in Thedas has heard of “neonatal resuscitation equipment” before.

“You owe me at _least_ one.” She sniffs. “If the woman thinks I’ll be the one passing her babe to her at birth, then I blame you for putting that idea in her head.”

Blackwall’s chuckle follows her as they walk side by side to the tavern.

Is it too selfish, Thea wonders faintly, to hope that Corypheus shows up with another dragon?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leopold's maneuvers are a common series of palpations used by health care practitioners to determine fetal position within the uterus. Someone will palpate the fundus (top of the uterus); walk their hands down the sides of the person's abdomen to feel for any "nubbies" (no, not official terminology); and then finally use either one or two hands (one hand is a little more uncomfortable, fuck off Thea) to press into the lower abdomen to feel for the "presenting part" (which part of the baby would be coming through the birth canal first if the person was in labour). 
> 
> It can sometimes be hard to tell/be accurate with these maneuvers for a variety of factors, hence why many practitioners supplement palpation with things like ultrasounds to confirm any suspicious findings, but we don't HAVE that in Thedas. Any guesses as to what Thea found that might have her so worked up?


	2. 'potch'-ed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drinks are had. Thea brainstorms, but nobody asked her to so it's all for her own machinations.

Thea’s three drinks in before Adrian shows up – she’s at a table with Blackwall and Sera and a few Inquisition archers she recognizes (by face, not by name), letting the raucous conversation wash over her. Her and Blackwall had gotten to the tavern just after lunch and it was now approaching dinnertime.

“ _ADE_!” she hollers when she spots her friend, waving her arm obnoxiously. Adrian sees her (obviously), face scrunched in a laugh, and waves back before stopping by the Charger’s huddle to talk. Thea stares holes into Adrian’s back, realizes it’s futile, and goes back to laughing at Sera’s horrific impression of Corypheus – it always impresses the recruits. There are many (the number growing larger by the day!) who were not with them during Haven.

“That’s wild.” Thea says out loud, realizes her mistake, and clarifies when those at the table look at her, “That’s wild that there are people here who don’t know about Haven!”

Blackwall laughs, head thrown back; one recruit hurries to clarify, “Oh, Your Worship, we know about Haven - !” but Sera cuts him off.

“You weren’t _there_! That’s what she means. She’s drunk.”

“Am not.” Thea argues – there’s that anxiety in her stomach; that perpetual fear that she’s making a fool of herself; that at any time someone could look at her and say “ _hey, you’re not cut out for this, are you_?”

“Are too.” Sera’s face is impish, mouth twisted in a smirk. “Finish your drink before I order another, this lot was just leaving.”

One of the recruits splutters, but they eventually do, just in time for the waitress to bring them another round.

Thea considers herself to be good at holding her alcohol – even if she’s wasted she can usually keep herself under control. Occasionally she’ll get an ugly red flush, splotchy, that spreads down her neck and chest that tells her that even if she stops drinking now she’ll have a hell of a hangover the next morning, but people often express surprise at how sober she sounds after putting away enough liquor to make her head spin.

But the paranoia of being drunk often outweighs her desire to get thoroughly trashed – she can’t help but remember that night in Haven, the way the buzz of a celebratory pint had given way to sick, sinking shock when they were set upon by Corypheus and his red templars. Sometimes when she drinks enough to get sloppy, she can’t help wondering how even _less_ of a help she’d be in that state if something were to happen.

It’s a paranoid thought – as Solas has pointed out numerous times, Skyhold is a fortress and its location high in the mountains means they’ll see anything coming from miles away – but that dread doesn’t leave her and nothing kills a good buzz like _dread_.

Right now, though, Thea’s paranoia is outweighed by her need to cover that itching, growing anxiety, and so the alcohol goes down fast tonight.

Sera doesn’t give a shit – is, in fact, matching her, but she can feel Blackwall’s eyes on her each time another round is ordered.

This comes in waves too, Thea thinks – she gets anxious, doesn’t know what to do with herself when she’s in the worst of it. Anything minor or major can set it off, from a terse exchange with Cassandra in the war room to a close call with a giant out in the field. As much as she hates it, Cole was right. She can’t sit still, has rarely been able to (Adrian can sometimes work on a project for fifteen hours straight – Thea can only focus if she’s got four things out in front of her to switch sporadically between. It helps with missives and negotiations that Josephine wants her to send out, when she can switch between projects if her inspiration for one lapses, but it doesn’t help her with consistency). Despite her best efforts to avoid stewing in her negative thoughts, she often ends up leaning on old reliable crutches – like alcohol – to get her through these “waves”, to distract her from the worst of her thoughts, just enough to make it back out on the other side.

Maybe it’s more of a “dip” than a wave.

“Do you speak with the refugees often, Warden Blackwall?” she asks him as Sera scoops their empty tankards up to move them to the end of the table.

“From time to time.” Blackwall responds, leaning back in his chair and turns his head so he can properly take her in. One elbow rests on the back of his chair, which opens up his broad chest towards her. “It’s good to hear from them what they’re still in need of.”

After a beat, he admits, “And there are many among them who express interest in joining the ranks of the Inquisition.”

Ah, there it is. A military man at heart. Thea snorts and teases, “Does Rutherford compensate you for your outsourcing?”

“I serve the Inquisition gladly.” Is Blackwall’s dry reply, and Thea can’t help her surprised bark of laughter.

“Why’d you even _come_ here if you were going to talk _boring_ stuff?” Sera asks loudly – she’s got a flush high on her freckled cheeks.

“Just to piss you off,” Thea coos, dodges Sera’s spindly elbow. “Why, what do you want to talk about?”

“ _Anything_ except whatever you two are moon-eyeing at each other over!”

“Sera!” Blackwall chokes out a laugh, and Thea feels her ears turn red.

“Then tell me,” she leans instead towards the archer, “why I saw Lady Josephine the other day stalking about, absolutely livid. Something about someone replacing all her ink with…?”

Sera howls with her head thrown back, face screwed up into delight and needs no additional prompting to launch into a (well-earned, from the sounds of all the preparation that went into it!) bragging explanation of her prank.

Blackwall’s chuckling into his tankard and they both let the elf go off. Thea’s feeling a little bloated from how much beer she’s consumed, but it’s making those swirling thoughts quiet to a dull buzz in the back of her head.

Still, Leda surfaces, especially when Sera takes a break from her story to speak to a pair of women Thea’s pretty sure are Red Jennies. Thea is ill-equipped without the standard electronic equipment of the modern world, and even though she was lucky enough to have a preceptor who expected her to master more “traditional” methods of auscultation, it’s not as if anyone’s invented a fetoscope yet – at least, she assumes they haven’t since she hasn’t yet seen a healer use a stethoscope!

Unless…

Without thinking, spurred by the sudden idea, she puts her hand over Blackwall’s, leans in to his space and asks him, “Will you make something for me?”

The conversation around them continues on but all of a sudden it feels like they're the only ones in the room; Thea gets a feeling, like she’s suddenly overstepped a boundary she didn’t even know was there, can feel the heat radiating off the back of Blackwall’s hand into her palm. His eyes are dark with drink when he says immediately, almost gruffly, “ _Anything_.”

Oh boy. That’s a lot to unpack.

“Careful, or I’ll take advantage of that.” She teases without thinking; then, “I want to try to make a horn to listen to a baby’s heartbeat with.”

Blackwall blinks at her; the intensity between them fizzles and pops out.

“I have to admit,” he says, making no move to remove his hand from under hers. “Of all the things you might have asked for, that one wasn’t on the list.”

Thea risks the contact a few seconds longer; then pulls her hand back and explains, “There’s a device where I come from called a Pinard horn. It’s only about this big,” she demonstrates with her hands, “And it’s hollow, made of wood. You can place it on the pregnant person’s abdomen and hear the baby’s heartbeat through it.”

“Oh, aye?” Blackwall rubs his chin, already nodding. “S’pose I could try to make something like that for you.”

Then he looks at her, asks with a smile, “Are you taking on patients after all?”

“Absolutely not.” Thea is saved from a sharp remark about his referral skills by Adrian saying, “Hello-o-o, what are we talking about over here?”

“Boring stuff!” Sera yowls – she sticks her legs straight out under the table and nearly takes Thea out at the knees.

“Looks boring.” Adrian squeezes Thea’s shoulder as they pass behind her and sits across the table. “How was your day?”

“Good,” Thea gives them a relieved smile. “Helped out at the clinic, then Blackwall surprised me with a new friend.”

Blackwall laughs, though he always seems a bit more subdued around Adrian. Thea always attributed it to them not having many chances to speak to each other one on one.

“Oh?” Adrian’s face is carefully neutral. “How so?”

With a bit of a splutter, Blackwall explains bringing Leda to see Thea, and Adrian looks over at her to gauge her reaction.

Giving her friend a smile, Thea jokes, “If only we’d fallen through to Thedas with the contents of my desk as well – was a real struggle to remember my schoolwork.”

Adrian knows her enough to probably pick up on her nervousness, but easily adds, “My life would be a lot easier if I’d been allowed to grab a few things, sure.”

“What did you get up to today?” Thea steers the conversation back to Adrian, who gladly launches into their latest schematic idea for Dorian’s staff.

“I talked to him already so don’t worry.” Adrian points at Thea, who raises her hands in deference – they _both_ remember the disaster of trying to give Solas new armour without first consulting him. For a man who wanders around Thedas in the equivalent of long johns, he’s surprisingly _picky_.

“How come I never get anything good?” Sera sticks her tongue out with a noise.

“I gave you that rune for your bow, you know!” Adrian protests, a smile tucked into the corner of their mouth. “And the bees!”

“I gave you the _recipe_ for the bees!” is Sera’s rebuttal, but the blonde elf looks wickedly amused.

“And I supplied the _bees_ , you’re _welcome_.”

Blackwall’s chuckling to himself, and Thea can’t help glancing over at him with a smile of her own. She feels, incrementally, her shoulders relaxing from their tense, rigid posture.

Thea’s anxiety eases off now that Adrian’s here, and after the next beer she waves off Sera’s attempts to order another round.

“Josephine’s going to kill me, I haven’t signed off on that Antivan missive yet.” Thea cuts her eyes at Adrian, who easily takes the hint and rises from their seat.

“I’ll look it over with you,” Thea’s friend shrugs on their cloak and together they say their goodbyes to Sera and Blackwall – Thea catches Blackwall’s eyes as she rises, and asks, “Can I come see you tomorrow morning?”

The man nods, raises his tankard to her in a goodbye as the two Inquisitors take their leave. Thea exchanges a look and an eyebrow raise with the Iron Bull in lieu of a hello, and they push past a group of raucous guardsmen on their way out.

Climbing the stairs to the Hall, Adrian easily keeps up a stream of chatter about their time in the forge.

“I think I’ve _just_ got a good addition figured out for your longbow,” Adrian’s saying as they pass Varric, deep in conversation with another dwarf, “And it’s like, that kinda tourmaline-ish gemstone I found in the cave by the Storm Coast, it’s gonna look sick – ”

“Your Worships!” they both recognize the voice behind them and in unison their footsteps quicken. Adrian’s explanation doesn’t even falter and neither of them look back at the frazzled dressmaker Josephine brought in to start on their outfits for the Winter Palace. Both of them have been putting off the measurements as long as they can and the dressmaker has started trying to track them down whenever they’re back at Skyhold. Thea feels a little guilty – he’s obviously just trying to do his job – but thankfully he’s not yet willing to physically apprehend the twin Heralds of Andraste, so as long as they can outpace him they’re safe.

“ – And it should interact nicely with your exploding arrows too!” Adrian finishes as they make it to the door of the quarters at a near sprint, slamming it behind them.

“We can’t keep putting it off,” Thea sighs, feeling the guilt roil in her stomach along with the beer. “But every time I think about all those giant skirts in Val Royeaux I wanna barf. We don’t have to wear something like that, do we?”

“I feel like we can argue for military uniforms.” Adrian looks just as horrified at the thought as she does.

“I wouldn’t mind, like, an embroidered skirt,” Thea remarks as they enter the common area of their quarters – overstuffed couches, already-lit fireplace, and various knick knacks they’d collected from their travels. Adrian’s started a collection of crystals and stones along the mantle of the fireplace, and Thea’s got a variety of dried flowers and paper kites hanging from some of the rafters, given to the Inquisitors by some children in Redcliffe. “Like a cool Slavic embroidery vibe, y’know? Put a sash on it for me to hide a knife in. But I’m not wearing those hooped monstrosities.”

“Very reasonable.” Adrian stands in front of the fire to chase the chill from their bones; then turns to fix Thea with a look.

“Did Blackwall put you in a position you didn’t want to be in?”

“Oh, I wish he put me in _some sort of_ position.” Thea waggles her eyebrows – when Adrian rolls their eyes, she continues, “No, I – it just caught me off guard. I had almost forgotten I told everyone about the midwifery thing. Different priorities, right? But she was very sweet, and Blackwall meant well.”

“She’s healthy? Everything…seem okay?” Adrian’s still following that line of tension in Thea’s spine, the way she hunches a bit to the left when she’s wound tight.

With a big sigh, as if the question gave Thea the in-road that she needed, the brunette flops down on the couch, lays herself down across it and groans, “I don’t _know_. Do you think magical ultrasounds are a thing? Do you think Dorian can wave his hands and give us an x ray into someone’s uterus?”

“So everything didn’t seem okay.” Adrian guesses – is still standing in front of the fire, giving Thea the space she needs to circle the drain towards what’s really bothering her.

Throwing her arm over her eyes, Thea groans, “Ades, I think the baby’s breech.”

“Okay…I’m not sure how to respond to that. Talk me through this.” She can hear Adrian moving, feels the couch depress when they sit down. Thea realizes that Cassandra calls the hole in the sky “The Breach” and sees how that might be confusing.

So she talks about it – about Blackwall bringing the refugee to her; about her clumsy ministrations in the healer’s quarters.

“I palpated and I’m pretty sure I felt the baby’s head up by her ribcage,” Thea admits; at Adrian’s silence, she wails, “The baby’s _breech_ , and it's far enough along that it’s probably gonna come butt first! Back home that’s a C-section! Realistically, I know people have birthed babies butt-first before and we’ve overmedicalized a lot of stuff about birth…but I’ve only been taught to do it in an _emergency_! If it truly comes out butt-first then whatever, but if its _leg_ comes out first, or the cord slips down - !”

“Okay.” Adrian says again, and thinks. “So, what can you do about it?”

Thea’s so engrossed in trying to visualize her emergency skills textbook that the question catches her off guard.

“Huh?”

“What can you, realistically, do about it?”

“I…know that sometimes obstetricians can try to internally rotate the baby,” Thea mutters, sliding her palms up her face to cover her eyes. “But that’s a skill I don’t get taught _and_ it comes with a risk of triggering labour – ”

“And I take it a C-section is out of the question?” Adrian laughs when Thea peeks through her fingers to glare at them. “I mean, I _figured_ , but worth asking.”

With a sigh, Adrian points out, “I know that I can tell you to “not worry” and it’s not going to be helpful because you’re going to worry anyways.”

“True.” Thea agrees – watches her friend sling their arm along the back of the couch and worry a loose thread with their fingertips.

“There’s a lot for us to worry about. We’re heading out to the Emerald Graves in about a week, anyways. This baby has to come out, right?”

“Right.”

“And there’s nothing you can do to…unbreech the baby.”

“Unbreech the – ” Thea snorts. “Right.”

“And we do have healers here. I’m assuming magic also works on babies. So she’ll give birth. And then whatever happens, happens.”

Thea sighs deeply – then reaches out to pat Adrian’s thigh, near her head.

“You’re right.” She mutters; then adds, “I’m working myself up and I’m just going to stress myself out and Leda too if I keep freaking. I probably won’t even be here when she goes into labour. I mean, I’m still going to worry about it. But you’re right.”

“I know.” Adrian pauses, then reaches down to bop her on the nose with their finger. “That’s a good first step.”

As always, Adrian’s tendency to surprise her with a face touch makes Thea yelp; then her friend is getting up and asking, “So about that missive for Josephine – ”

“Uh-h-h, she won’t mind if I give it to her tomorrow morning, right?” the beer’s settled in Thea’s stomach now, making her a curious combination of queasy and sleepy.

“I’m making tea!” Adrian’s voice floats over to her. “So sit up before you fall asleep.”

“No-o-o-o…”

* * *

The mornings at Skyhold are always _freezing_ – Thea wakes with one arm out from under her wool blanket and starts the day with a chill. As always, her sleep was fitful after copious alcohol consumption and she’s got a headache brewing behind her eyes. Not the best start.

Still, the sooner she sees Blackwall and gets something figured out about what she wants him to make, the sooner she can get it off her mind and focus on something else. Maybe the garden – she wants to make room for any new seed samples she can bring back from the Emerald Graves. They’ve only managed to establish one main camp there, and there might be more useful herbs as they go further in.

Outside her door, she can hear Adrian moving around – it’s hard to tell if they’re up early or just going to bed. Probably the latter, considering they’re fresh off of a new idea.

Rolling out of bed, Thea layers her wool skirt over stockings and a long linen tunic, braids her hair back from her face and heads out with her shawl wrapped around her. By the time she exits her room, Adrian’s door is closed and her suspicions are confirmed when she sees a stack of papers on the desk that weren’t there before. Oh, Adrian…

It’s early still, and Skyhold is quiet just after the sun rising. Thea doesn’t pass many people – she deliberates briefly about going down to the kitchens but she knows the morning is busy for the servants, and one of the cooks does _not_ like when she tries to sneak in for bread or cheese.

She’s almost to the barn before she wonders if Blackwall’s even up – but even as she draws closer to the courtyard she can see the lamp hung above the door that signals that someone’s up and about inside.

It’s either Blackwall, or one of the healers – either way, she’ll have something to keep her mind busy.

Turns out it’s Blackwall, stoking the fire over which is hung a pot of water.

“Good morning!” his voice is boisterous for so early in the morning and Thea briefly closes her eyes.

“It sure is…morning.” she hasn’t used her voice yet today, and has to clear it a few times when it comes out all stuck.

With an amused exhale, Blackwall remarks, “My Lady, I’ve seen you after a rough sleep at camp – you struck me of more of a morning person.”

“I _did_?” Thea tends to rise earlier than Adrian, but Adrian also tends to go to bed later than Thea so she always assumed it just evened out. “Well, I’m sorry to shatter the illusion.”

With a shake of his head, Blackwall assures, “No illusion has been shattered.”

With a suspicious squint, she lectures, “Now, remember what we talked about, putting people on pedestals, _Warden-Constable_ Blackwall, receiver of the Silver – ”

Something changes in Blackwall’s eyes that has Thea faltering before she even finishes the line.

“Ah.” She says. “I just meant – I’m kind of a dick, Blackwall. Not a great person. But people give me passes because I’ve got a nightlight for a hand and a title someone gave me that I didn’t really want. If me being unwashed with half of a hangover makes that whole “gilded Herald” thing less of a part of how you really see me, then I’m glad for it.”

There’s a beat of awkward silence, where Thea wonders what she actually said wrong; then Blackwall nods, tells her in a more subdued, quieter tone, “The whole “gilded Herald” aspect is not the most appealing part of your personality, by any means.”

Dammit. That's sweet. Thea gives him a shy smile and abruptly Blackwall straightens up, clears his throat.

“I, ah, wasn’t sure when you’d be by,” he says, gesturing to the tin cups laid out on the stool beside the fire. “But I made something to wake m’self up, thought you’d appreciate…”

“Thank you.” She says, sincerely – the dark grinds in the pot over the fire smell more like chicory root than coffee bean. She’s had a few conversations with Dorian, and apparently in Tevinter they have a strong stimulative drink called _caffyea_ ; but so far in Ferelden she hasn’t seen its prevalence the way it is back home. The “chicory” is the root of a plant she’s heard called “sailor’s buttons” and the concoction, regardless of herbal combinations, is often just called “potch”; amongst the nobles (though also available to commoners!) it’s dried blocks of tea that are more highly desired. Potch is something Thea sees more at camp and on the ramparts, as it can be drank straight and strong with little to no additives; the bitter black tea brought in from across the sea is traditionally accompanied by something sweet (jam or honey, or pieces of heavy cake) so is a bit more laborious to set up on the road.

(Not that _that_ stops Madame de Fer!)

Thea’s favourite thing about potch is that the combinations of personal blends are endless, and it always feels oddly intimate to find out what someone adds to their potch mixture. Adrian tinkered for a while with theirs, and they still switch up what blend they bring on the road with them, but Thea’s noticed a woodiness that’s permeated their latest batch, something that smooths the potch base into something that reverberates down her throat during a late night on the road. She only has to smell Adrian’s blend to remember quiet snatches of moments; drowsing next to the fire on a pile of blankets while Adrian and Solas ran over old copies of maps to elven ruins; coming in to the tent from running a training session with the Iron Bull in the rain and Adrian giving her a mug of potch while she squeezed water out of her braid; camping under the stars and feeling like she could trip and fall upwards into the pinwheeling endlessness of galaxies and constellations that she’ll never be able to name in a lifetime if she tried. She wonders, out of everything in Thedas, if she’ll miss those memories the most if they ever make it back.

She’s only ever tried a few other’s potch blends. Sera (usually the person with the most jars of potch in her traveling kit and hence Thea’s go-to for an early morning cup after Adrian), uses so many dried flowers in hers that Thea was worried it would be too perfumey – but the blend is saved by some sort of dried berry that lends a dry, spicy kick. Thea herself prefers an almost medicinal undertone to hers and has scouted out the closest equivalent to sage and juniper that she can find in Thedas and uses them to temper the earthiness of the base root. On their last expedition, the Iron Bull had told her a story about a mercenary he worked with who incorporated a type of moss off trees in his potch and now Thea’s itching to try it.

(“You’re not bullshitting me to make me drink moss water, are you?” she had clarified after a beat, because her “normal” meter was still off-kilter in Thedas even after all these months.

“I’m not bullshitting you, boss.” had been the Iron Bull’s amused reply.)

So she’s curious, what Blackwall’s blend is. Will he even have a blend? Maybe a guy who spent most of his time alone in the forest looking for recruits is a straight-potch kinda dude.

“I laid out some supplies that might be useful,” Blackwall’s saying as he pours her a mug and hands it off to her – when he steps aside, she can see woodworking tools laid out on the bench, along with several different pieces of wood, obviously already sawed short and cleaned up prior to her arrival. “Perhaps you could draw out the design and we’ll work out the details as we go?”

The fact that Blackwall is actually _doing this_ for her – even though she’s asking him to momentarily ignore the hole in the sky, ignore his search for Grey Warden relics, and help make her a stupid little horn because she asked him to while she was drunk – hits her just as she raises the mug to her lips and catches the scent of the potch. It has a surprisingly sweet, honey-like undertone, but above all else it’s _smoky_. She can’t for the life of her tell if it’s from an additive or just from being stored near a stove but it’s the same smell that Blackwall carries on his gambeson every time she gets close to him. Right now, he’s looking at her so openly and warmly in the watery morning light that everything just kind of coalesces on her at once, sitting in Blackwall’s space, drinking his potch with a shawl around her shoulders; this warm sticky feeling of wanting to jump someone’s bones and make a home in them at the same time.

Well, _fuck_ , Thea thinks helplessly. Just… _fuck_. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did ANYBODY ask me to make up fantasy substitutions for coffee? No? Whoops.


	3. shakedown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note added tags for brief Inquisitor/Bull and implied sexual content. I'm not sorry lmao

Here’s the thing.

Thea _likes_ Blackwall, yeah? Has an unfortunate “thing” for sturdy people who look capable of choking her (hence why she followed the Iron Bull around like a puppy dog for the first five months of him joining up with the Inquisition. Then she realized he was down to clown and they’ve been fucking on and off as needed). Her jokes with Adrian aside, she assumed it was that same infatuation – gruff lumberjack found in the woods, Thea goes a little googly-eyed, whatever.

But she _likes_ him. Has legitimately wanted to woo him, show interest in _his_ interests. The most she can muster right now is to respond to his teasing, flirting remarks which, if coming from any other soldier, would result in a scathing, sarcastic cut down from Thea (who automatically assumes from past experiences that men who respond to her sense of humour are just patronizing her).

She sees Blackwall take Varric’s good-natured ribbing in stride; sees him coax Sera into as many bawdy jokes as she coaxes _him_ into; sees him attempt camaraderie with Solas ( _Thea_ finds it hard to attempt camaraderie with Solas, she genuinely doesn’t know how Adrian does it!) and she thinks he’s a good man.

("Sure,” Adrian had agreed when Thea pointed it out. “He’s a good man. So why did he spend all that time alone in the woods when all the Wardens had gone missing? Why didn’t he search them out?”

“Not all of us are lucky enough to be literally dropped out of the sky into an unfolding situation.” Thea had teased – this was an age-old conversation topic for them. Adrian had a lot of questions for Blackwall when he first showed up, and Blackwall hadn’t quite managed to impress them with his answers.

“Har, har.” )

Blackwall had always treated her and Adrian with some level of respectful admiration – he made it clear that they were the ones in charge of this whole operation and should be addressed and treated as such. For a while Thea had wondered if he just didn’t like that whole power-dynamic schtick – was she technically his boss? That’s a bit icky, she supposes.

But lately, she’s gotten the feeling that maybe he feels the same way – has caught him looking at her, seeking her out in a crowd at the tavern, giving her his undivided attention.

Thea’s spent her whole time in Thedas – time that has spanned almost _two years_ – fighting back in the only way she knows how when she’s been ripped from every aspect of her life save for Adrian. She was shoved through this door and she can’t undo that, but she _can_ keep her foot wedged firmly in it, can wrangle every bit of hope out that whatever happened in their world can happen in Thedas; that they can (and will!) at any moment be flung back to a world where Thea went to school, looked forward to her future career, saw her friends and parents and roamed streets familiar to her from almost three decades of life.

She refuses to release her stranglehold on that hope, and she refuses to put down any roots that would make leaving Thedas even a fraction as hard as leaving home. It’s already hard – to sit in Sera’s tavern room and laugh so hard that her face hurts; to feel Varric’s friendly slap to the back as he congratulates her on a good shot; to listen to Josephine talk about her sister and her family and try not to scream _none of this feels real to me!!!_

And it’ll be even harder if she looks at Blackwall and begins to contemplate what he’ll look like a decade or two from now, if his looks will mellow into the handsomeness of an old gentleman, if growing old with someone like that soothes the edge of anxiety that rears up whenever Thea contemplates just _how close_ she’s come to death in the last couple years –

Okay. She’s not doing it. She’s not thinking it. But it’s _hard_. Thea swallows the new lump in her throat and takes another sip of smoky potch to cover it.

She stays briefly, enough to sketch out on parchment the size and shape of what she wants; maintains that it has to be hollow; and begs off more potch before her desire to sit with Blackwall all day overwhelms her.

“Come back tomorrow,” Blackwall insists when she makes up some Inquisitor business to get to. “I’ll have a few tries made up by then.”

“I really appreciate any time you can spend on it,” she assures, embarrassed. “Really. If I’m keeping you from other business – ”

“This is time well spent.” Blackwall assures with a crooked smile. “And I’m curious how well it will work.”

“You could mass produce it if it’s any good.” is her suggestion. “Sell them to midwives all over the continent.”

“There’s a thought.” Blackwall snorts. “Ah, well. For now, you’re the only midwife who’ll reap the potential rewards.

“Besides,” he adds. “My days at Skyhold are slow if the Heralds do not need my services. This gives me something to do with my hands.”

Thea, without thinking, snickers and says, “Your hands are exceptionally talented as always, Warden Blackwall.”

Blackwall’s bashful laugh stays ringing in her ears all the way back up to the Main Hall, and she can’t help the goofy grin spreading across her face as she scurries through the main doors.

Varric sees her passing his table, points at her and asks sharply, “Have you had breakfast?”

“Yes, absolutely!” she waves at him as she passes, then takes a sharp turn to escape to the garden.

Her plan was to spend the day in the garden – it usually makes her mind empty in a good way, when she can focus on the physical work. But the garden has expanded, and many of the Chantry Mothers and Sisters have been eager to take on those responsibilities. By the time she wanders in and speaks to one of the herbalists, she’s disappointed to learn that there’s nothing much for her to sink her teeth into today. She wastes half an hour helping string up some herbs in the storerooms adjacent to the garden courtyard, but that’s idle work and the thoughts come back in. She’s going over her packing list for the Emerald Graves, mentally mapping out the quickest way to send for supplies if Leda goes into labour ( _should she alert the servants just in case? No, okay, that’s overkill_ ) and eventually she has to leave.

(On the way out, Varric physically bars her path until she accepts a still-warm biscuit from breakfast. She takes two bites in front of him to appease, then slips the rest into her apron pocket to crumble up for the birds on the ramparts.)

Really, she’s looking for _Adrian_ , but they’re not in the forge – Harritt mentions that Commander Rutherford had been by to speak to them. Thea’s pretty sure Rutherford’s office is up on the ramparts (though she’s never been, Rutherford was never her…go to guy for conversation) and she heads across the courtyard to climb up onto the walls.

Then she comes across the Iron Bull.

There’s a training area that Cassandra set up almost immediately upon their arrival to Skyhold. The majority of their practice weapons are stored in the adjoining building, and there are a variety of targets and practice forms that get lined up against the wall when not in use. If Thea ever needs to find Cassandra she’s usually hanging around here, supervising recruits or taking out her own energy on a target. After Cassandra (and Rutherford, though not as much as at Haven), Bull is there the most frequently. He’s usually accompanied by one or more of the Chargers but today he’s alone, using his two-handed axe and infusing a surprising amount of grace into his movements for a guy who’s probably near seven feet tall.

Thea means to walk by, but her pace incrementally slows and she ends up leaning against one of the low stone walls by the training ground to observe. Bull is not the only Qunari she’s met while in Thedas but she’s still not used to the sight of him – how tall he is, the span of his horns. Seeing him training is one thing, seeing him on the battlefield is another matter entirely. Bull is a powerhouse and she’s never more glad to be on the Inquisition’s side as when she watches him barrel into a writhing mass of demons and come out on the other end splattered with gore and breathing heavy through his teeth.

Oh. Well, she’s getting distracted again but _these_ thoughts certainly don’t make her _anxious_.

As she’s thinking Bull lowers his axe, sits on a nearby bale to catch his breath; then finally looks at her.

“Got a lot of thoughts in there, boss?”

Thea exhales – after Adrian, the Iron Bull always does a phenomenal job interpreting her posture and facial expressions.

Then again, he is a _spy_.

“Too many.” She admits. “Most of them are useless. I want a refund.”

Bull grunts – as he often does when she says something he doesn’t quite understand.

“Want to take a stab at it?” Bull gestures to the targets behind him and Thea shrugs one shoulder.

“Can you run me through an exercise?” she asks. “Might need a shakedown to stop thinking so loud.”

“Yeah, we can do that.” Bull takes a few more moments to stand again while Thea hunts around in storage for one of the wooden training daggers.

She’d had a few dicey moments outside Skyhold where someone managed to get way closer than any of her weapons could handle – she carries a bow most of the time but has also started experimenting with a blowgun she can load with poisons. She’s carried a shitty dagger on her hip since arriving at Haven but she only uses it to cut up food stores on the road ( _much_ to Cassandra’s horror - Thea is pretty sure she’s named all of her weapons and treats them with the utmost respect) – having to use it on a red templar who had gotten close enough to knock her off her feet was a sobering experience, one that left her ultimately triumphant but not without a few injuries. It wasn’t long afterwards that she expressed an interest in learning some close-combat skills.

The Iron Bull had been more than happy to put her through her paces. He was a brutal teacher, but fair – wasn’t afraid to knock the breath out of her when she made a misstep but would easily give out compliments when she showed improvement. He had shown her a few ways to disarm someone, or to buy herself enough time to get out of range and he expected her to keep up her practice – if he accompanies them out to the field, Thea knows that she can expect the Qunari mercenary to crook a few fingers at her, insist on running them through again and again until she manages to stay on her feet.

Once she’s warmed up, Bull has her practice her stance.

“Go from bow to blade.” He instructs. “If you’re heading into a close-range fight, you’ll only have a few seconds to change weapons. You should be able to perform the movement quickly, no hesitation.”

She goes through it three times; after the third, Bull says “Good” and then hefts his axe and comes at her.

She remembers this one; slaps her blade against the flex of his forearm to simulate a slash, then spins to the side of him and quickly paces the required ten feet from Bull that marks the exercise “completed”.

“You’re slow.” Bull comments. “Again.”

Dagger back in sheath, bow lifted. Deep breath. Thea thinks of Leda’s belly, if she’ll have to bring her dagger to cut the cord at the birth.

Bull moves, Thea skitters; runs a ring around Bull, manages to get under his arms for a few jabs but eventually decides to simply scramble back the ten feet.

“Hm. Again.”

Sheath. Lift. Breathe. Thea thinks of the heat of Blackwall’s hand in the tavern, thinks of him kneeling over her after that templar took a chunk out of her, voice tight and gruff with what she later realized was panic.

Bull is suddenly very close and her surprise sits in a knot behind her sternum – she already knows she fucked up, but is at least determined to lose with her dagger in her hand. Dagger out, make it count.

By the time she fully realizes her mistake it’s too late – Bull anticipates her wide, sloppy swing and surprises her by taking hold of the arm with the dagger and changes her trajectory, forces her elbow to bend as he pulls her forward, off-kilter. Thea gives a yelp of surprise and instinctively tries to brace against his arm with her free hand, but by the time she does, she realizes he’s used the bend of her arm to “plunge” her own dagger into her belly, ending the match.

“You’re not paying attention, boss.” Bull says – not disappointed or judging, just pointing out facts. She tests the strength of his grip but he keeps her digging the blunt dagger into her own stomach.

“I’m really not.” She agrees – she can feel her heartbeat in her face, can smell the Qunari from this close. “Sorry, Bull. Not that you’re not a good teacher, but this might not be the shakedown I need.”

Bull watches her for a beat longer, then releases her arm. She looks up at him, and he asks, “So? What kind of shakedown do you need?”

“Well now that you mention it…” she teases, clenching and unclenching her fist; but Bull waits her out and she can’t blame him – the way he operates, he needs her to _say_ it, and Thea’s always been awful about asking for what she wants.

“Will you come back to my room?” she asks. “And help me just not think for a while?” 

“Good.” Bull praises. “I can do that.”

They don’t speak again until Bull’s up in her room, when he stops her with a hand on her chest as she wriggles out of her tunic and asks, “You remember the word?”

Nodding, Thea says, “It’s _katoh_ ”, is rewarded with Bull’s hand wrapping, instead, around her throat.

They don’t speak much after that, either.

* * *

Bull leaves after checking she’s alright, and Thea dozes for about half an hour. Then she pulls herself together; hopping back into her skirt and stockings, rebraiding her hair from where Bull sunk his fist into it, and heading down to the refugee tents.

The space by the front gates has turned into a veritable tent city – Thea would estimate that there are anywhere from sixty to a hundred civilians here who don’t permanently work at or out of Skyhold. There are more if you count merchants who cycle through the castle with their wares, but the people who stay here usually don’t find a permanent place in Skyhold, only remain long enough to catch their breath and then disperse. When Thea gets down there, a few children are playing a game of kickball that winds its way around clusters of tents. The ground is thawing from the frost of the morning, so the stitched hide ball splatters a bit of slushy mud on tent walls and trouser legs when it’s kicked too viciously.

Thea’s presence always receives a mixed reaction: some have seen her around the clinic and don’t connect the dots unless they’ve seen her hand. Others know her face, have seen her out in the field and they whisper about her from afar, faces full of curiosity.

Thea allows herself a few moments of aimless wandering until she flags down someone to ask if they’ve see a pregnant woman around.

“Your Worship!” Leda exclaims when Thea is shown into her tent. It looks like she’s sharing the space with a few other families – one woman with a toddler is introduced as Leda’s sister Alyse. She’s a solid, calming presence against her sister’s nervous bubbliness, and breastfeeds her child while they speak. Alyse had attended a few births in their village before they fled but looks a bit bewildered when Thea shares her suspicion about the baby being upside down.

“If it’s a true breech – if the legs are tucked up and the backside comes first, the circumference is similar to the head and things can progress in a similar way,” Thea explains. “But sometimes baby ends up in a weird position with their legs and it can affect the labour.”

Alyse considers this, then asks, “Will you be here for the birth?”

“I – leave Skyhold in a few days,” Thea splutters with a bit of nervousness. “I would stay, but…I’m needed to close rifts - !”

“I wouldn’t want to trouble you, Inquisitor!” Leda assures her, one hand rubbing over her belly.

“It’s no trouble,” Thea half-lies. “Please, as I said, call for me. If I’m here, I’ll come. But if I’m not, I would want a healer here with you. Just because I’m paranoid!” she follows that up when the sisters exchange glances. “The healer will probably be mad that I made them sit there for nothing.”

“Are all your healers mages?” Alyse asks slowly, despite Leda’s embarrassed, “hush!”

Thea meets her gaze calmly.

“No, but there are many who voluntarily agreed to help the sick.” She points out. “And this war has affected them much the same as it’s affected you.”

Alyse draws in a breath, but Leda quickly babbles, “And we have no qualms with those who want to help the Inquisition! In fact, we have a cousin who was in the Circle in – ”

“Leda.” Alyse is the one to hush her sister now, and her eyes again meet Thea’s, unflinchingly.

“I’m told you’re not from Ferelden,” she remarks. “Is magic so different where you come from?”

Thea resists the urge to bristle.

“Everything is different where I come from,” she evades. “And there are still concepts here that I need adjusting to. The mages at the clinic want to help, and I give them the same trust that you’ve all given me as one of the Inquisitors.”

With a wry smile, Thea suggests, “Besides, closing Rifts is its own kind of magic, isn’t it? Maybe in that sense, I am _also_ a mage?”

Leda giggles but Alyse shakes her head.

“It is not the same.” There’s conviction in her voice.

Thea forgets, sometimes – when she spends time with their companions (three of whom are powerful mages in their own right!), it’s easy to forget how magic is viewed by people who might have lived their whole lives without meeting a mage. Leaving Leda’s tent, Thea wonders what Alyse’s reaction would have been if Thea had mentioned the other things she’s been able to do since the Fade spat her out in Thedas.

Dorian’s called it “lay magic” a few times (it sounded like an insult, but sometimes Dorian makes _everything_ sound like an insult); Solas called it “curious”; Corypheus called it “a gross insult to talent” when he’d watched Thea ricochet across the burning landscape of Haven towards Adrian, palm out towards a red templar to send him stumbling backwards without touching him.

(That was Thea’s favourite description of it, by far. Fueled entirely by her spite of the crochety old corpse, it’s become one of her favourite inside jokes and sometimes her and Adrian shriek it at each other after a particularly good practice session.

“That killing blow was a gross insult to talent, dude!” Thea will bellow as Adrian rides by on their horse, leaving the practice dummy in tatters.

“What a gross insult to talent, I hate it!” Adrian whoops when Thea lands an easy bullseye on her target.)

She assumes that the Mark keeps a lifeline to the Fade stretched open – that’s the only explanation she has as to why her and Adrian, who come from a place where the Fade as they know it doesn’t exist, have the ability to perform subtle, minute “spells”.

It took her a while to even _notice_ – in her defense, there was a _lot_ going on that first year and the subtlety of whatever it was (magic, lay magic, an insult) meant that it was easy to brush it off as “luck”.

Things come easier, sometimes – things fit where she wants them, stand out when she’s looking for them. Touching Adrian on the shoulder means they’re able to roll the next hit off their shoulders a little better; clasping Varric’s hand as he helps steady her on an incline means the healing incision on his forearm knits together just a little faster.

Sometimes, too: when haggling with a merchant or a bartender or a surly farmer on the road, Thea can take a word, a phrase, a _feeling_ and _push_ it through the air…press it gently into a person’s ear. She can see when it takes root behind their eyes. It doesn’t always work but more often than not the “nudge” can help her out.

(“Sprouts stretching towards the sun,” Cole had murmured after watching her talk a bottle of old elven wine out of the hands of a man who made a living pilfering the ruins of war-torn homes for things to sell. “Shifting your will, shuttling it into a mind, making room like it’s always belonged. A certainty they don’t know they didn’t know before.”

“Cole, you’re _really_ harshing my vibe.” She had muttered back, feeling guilty – not like she’s ever convinced someone to do something _dangerous_ before, she just really wanted that wine!

It was _so_ worth it by the way.)

Varric tells her dwarves don’t dream – Thea doesn’t here either, not like Adrian, whose own magic manifests more in dreams that have a taste of the future; and whose fascination with the Rifts and their proclivity for magic growing more powerful the closer they get to one means they’ve worked on it extensively with Solas.

Truth be told, Thea can’t look too long at the Rifts unless she wants the bile in her stomach to creep up her throat. The Fade makes her nauseous.

(Everything makes her nauseous, and Thea's unfortunately practiced at being sick in the worst situations; at some points, vomiting is almost a relief – not that she’d say _that_ out loud.)

* * *

Her feet take her, without really thinking, to Solas’ atrium. He’s got his paints out but doesn’t look like he’s done more than add to the border along one of the walls. He throws a brief smile over his shoulder when she comes in; when she doesn’t immediately pass through to the stairs he turns more fully to look over his shoulder and asks, “Can I help you Inquisitor?”

Thea tries, she really does, to match Solas’ thoughtful, poetic prose – like trying to impress a preceptor all over again. But she’s tired; hunger is a dull scrape in her gut and she can feel the bruises left from the Iron Bull’s “shakedown” brewing under the surface of her skin.

So where she had meant to ask him about the existence of specialized childbirth magic, if he’d seen anything in the Fade to ease her anxiety about Leda – what comes out is,

“You ever delivered a baby before?”

The look on Solas’ face quickly tells her no, probably not. She didn’t expect him to splutter and ask, “I beg your pardon?”

She also didn’t expect the surprised bark of laughter from above – glancing up, she sees Dorian leaning on the railing. Even from this far she can see his gleeful expression.

“Hey, peanut gallery, have _you_?” she asks with her fists on her hips and the Tevinter mage quickly finds an excuse to disappear from view.

“You mentioned once that you were a midwife.” Solas has taken this moment to recover. “Are you…asking for a specific reason?”

Thea launches into her explanation about Leda, ends it with, “I’m imagining all the things that could go wrong!”

“I can see that” is Solas’ wry reply; he turns back to his paints for a moment, then points out with a sly undercurrent of sarcasm, “It’s a very old process, childbirth. I’ve been told that humans have been doing it for thousands of years. It will run its course whether we like it or not. You _have_ delivered babies before, have you not?”

“I’ve never been in _charge_ of anything before!” Thea protests – there’s another barking laugh from up above and Solas rolls his head to the side to give her a _very_ tired look.

“You are a Herald of Andraste,” he reminds her in the flat tone usually reserved for when she makes a bad joke in the middle of a battle. “Commander of a force that spans various kingdoms.”

Thea wrinkles her nose. “I like to think that’s more of a shared responsibility. Actually, if you ask me – ”

“I did not.”

“ – I think it’s more of an 80/20 split between Adrian and I.”

“You’ll have to tell me if Adrian agrees.” Solas murmurs into his paint box.

“You must have – I mean, people usually give birth at home here,” she pushes. “Did you witness anyone giving birth in your village before you left? Are there mages who specialize in healing…but like, for childbirth?”

“As I’ve said,” Solas steps back to examine his progress, “I spent most of my time dreaming. Those things were not…my specialty. As for your second question…”

Here he gives her another wry look, and she’s about to tell him off for being condescending when he asks, “Is childbirth a sickness that needs healing?”

Thea opens her mouth; closes it again; crosses her arms.

“I have, admittedly, pathologized this very beautiful and natural process in my anxiety.” She says, stilted. “And I have yet to temper my very practical need to be cautious into something productive.”

“Ah.” Solas turns back to his mural and Thea curses at herself. She leaves conversations with Solas sometimes feeling like a little kid. Although he’s dodged the question about his age, he looks like he’s in his mid- to late-thirties – but he talks as if he’s been around for two lifetimes over. At times, it’s hard to feel like the playing field is even.

“Perhaps you should speak with Cole,” Solas suggests, his back still to her. “He is a spirit of Compassion, after all. In many things, the journey of death is similar to the journey of birth.”

Dorian is _definitely_ laughing at her from the floor above.

“You’ve given me a lot to ponder here, Solas.” She says weakly – the smile Solas gives her is decidedly amused at her expense.

“Our talks are always illuminating, Inquisitor. Good afternoon.”

“Good afternoon.” Thea speed walks out of there to the Main Hall, ears hot.

Perfect.

It’s almost a comfort, then, to be ambushed by the Orlesian dressmaker. He’s accompanied by Josephine, who manages a scathing dressing down of Thea’s avoidance of a professional she hired without her voice ever going higher than a level, ambassadorial tone.

Okay. Thea deserves that one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Descriptions of fighting…..? I don’t know her.


	4. the "other breech"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a brief implication of disordered eating/body image; and the implication of alcoholism runs throughout the story. It's not explicit and is mentioned casually in passing but thought it fair to warn.

Thea’s never purposely sought Cole out before. She enters the tavern when the night’s already in swing – it took her a while to escape the dressmaker. This was really not a good time to have someone take measurements of her body.

(It’s never a good time, but it’s a bad brain day – remembering the dressmaker’s off handed remark about the ratio of her hips to her waist, Thea feels her skin crawl with displeasure and she avoids the Hall for dinner).

Ducking behind a post to avoid a man who’s enjoying Maryden’s raucous tavern song _too_ much (watch those arms, sir!), Thea climbs the stairs up to the second floor, keeps close to the wall in case Sera’s in her room; then ascends again.

The corner she’s seen Cole in before (and really, she’s just basing this off one encounter) is empty, piled high with chests and tapped kegs. She makes a little, awkward circle of the third floor, peeking up at the stone staircase that leads to the ramparts above. When she reaches the chest again she shoves her hands in her pockets, casts her eyes about and then whispers, “Uh, hey, Cole, you there?”

There’s silence.

“Cole.” She hums. “I’m looking for you? I guess? Hello?”

“Hello?” Cole parrots, suddenly beside her. Thea jolts away, instinctively; recovers with a breathless, “ _Cole_. Hi. Can I talk to you?”

“You are.”

“That’s fair, I walked into that.” Thea blows out a breath, points at the stairs up to the ramparts. “Can we talk up there?”

Cole’s whole body bobs, which she assumes is an affirmative, and he trails after her as she heads up into the cold evening air.

“Like a snowfall in the schoolyard,” Cole looks out over the mountains, “Like skiing in the mountains, before he couldn’t trust his own body, before it started hollowing out from the inside and I had to grow up – ”

“Why do you say things out loud?” Thea wants to know, thickly, before her anger flares. “Is it – can you control it? Have you tried?”

Cole blinks at her – the air is cold and stings her eyes.

“It must be…hard to be here.” Thea tries, has always been uncomfortable with longer silences. “And I know it’s not the same, not by a long shot, but…it’s hard for _me_ to be here, too.”

“You don’t like being here.” Again – it’s not a question when Cole says it that way.

With a wince, Thea deliberates about softening the statement (“ _Not that I HATE it…_ ” “ _I’ve really enjoyed meeting everyone!_ ”), but it’s useless in the face of Cole’s certainty.

“I don’t.” she confirms. “I don’t feel real.”

“But you are.” Cole presses. “You leave footprints, imprints. Hands on shoulders. A story for Varric to shape, after.”

“I know,” with a huff, Thea admits, “It’s hard to explain. Sometimes I get surprised…still. That people can see me. Sometimes I feel like a ghost. Like I shouldn’t be able to be seen by anyone.”

Cole hums.

“Can you disappear?”

Thea laughs.

“No! Not like you.”

“I don’t disappear,” Cole muses – moves as if drifting, along the wall. “People just forget. Move past. They see me when I’m needed.”

“Do you mind it?” she asks, following him; when Cole looks back at her, she clarifies, “Do you mind not being able to be seen all the time?”

“I don’t know.” Cole has a look on his face, as if he genuinely _doesn't_ , as if it has never occurred to him to think about it.

Thea gets a full body shiver up her spine, like someone’s walking over her grave – it’s sobering to remember that she’s speaking to a spirit wearing a dead (once dead?) boy’s body.

“You need me to tell you that the birth will be soft, easy, that someone will hold your hand.” Cole tilts his head to the side. “But I can’t tell you that.”

“I know.” Thea tries to joke, feeling embarrassment warming her face to hear it laid flat in front of her, “I was really, really hoping though…”

“No one expects you to be there, no one puts this on you. You gather it up, weigh it down on yourself. Not to help, to punish.”

With a defensive bristle, Thea protests, “I don’t!”

“Maybe I shouldn’t be here. Adrian will be fine. I can go off and climb up into the Breach and be done with it. I fail all the time, and it’s easier then trying again.”

Cole’s voice is muttering, tripping up speed as he continues the stream of consciousness and Thea shakes her head, backs up.

“Cole, stop. I don’t want to hear that.”

“You already hear it, so loud, all the time.” Cole cups a hand over his ear and says, “I hear it too. You won’t let it come out of you, so it comes out of me.”

The panicked realization – that perhaps Cole _can't_ control it, that perhaps it’s Thea’s own whirlpool of invasive thoughts that’s pushing itself through Cole’s mouth like a sieve – has Thea spluttering.

“I’m leaving.” She declares, turns on her heel and practically falls down the stairs back into the tavern. Cole doesn’t pursue her, and she doesn’t see him reappear.

On the way up to her room she runs into Adrian, who’s descending the stairs from the common quarters. Thea feels like there’s something in her throat that’s ready to come out – whether it’s tears or screaming, she doesn’t know.

“Hey, did you get a note from Josephine?” Adrian’s looking at the parchment in their hands. “She wants me to come down to her office.”

Thea wets her lips. “It’s a trap. She wants to set the dressmaker on you. They caught me this afternoon.”

Adrian gasps. “ _Montilyet_! The _betrayal_.”

As they look up at Thea, their brow creases.

“What happened?”

Thea shrugs her shoulders.

“What _hasn't_ happened? I feel like shit.”

“Have you eaten?” Adrian’s looking her over; sometimes it sucks to have someone know about all your bad habits, Thea thinks.

“Not yet.”

“Thea.” Adrian offers their arm. “C’mon, we can go down to the kitchens, apparently there was really good chicken tonight. _And_ this way I can uphold the time-honoured tradition of making that dressmaker wait.”

“Question for a friend,” Thea remarks as they both stroll down into the labyrinthine under hallways of Skyhold. “How does one turn off their thoughts without copious amounts of whiskey.”

“Oof. _That_ kinda day, huh?” Adrian thinks about this, solemnly. That’s another thing Thea likes about Adrian – no matter how ridiculous or poorly phrased Thea’s worries or fears are, Adrian approaches her questions with the same genuine thoughtfulness as they would with anything else (though they are ready _and_ willing to laugh at her, make no mistake). “Is this about…the breech? The Other Breech, I guess.”

Oh, that was clever. Adrian _knows_ it’s clever, as much as Thea doesn’t want to give them the satisfaction of her lips pressed together against a reluctant laugh.

Instead Thea nods, then admits, “It’s kind of like…hm. Like the baby thing exacerbated other stuff. So it’s kind of about baby. But not really about baby.”

This is new for her. Sometimes when she feels like this – coiled up, disgusted with herself – her initial desire is to keep it to herself, to continue winding herself into more and more of a foul mood until her emotions explode out of her in an unfair set of barbs against something (or someone).

She stills does that, to be fair. She’s not a perfect person. But Adrian helps. Has always given her that space to say all the stupid shit on her mind. She owes it to Adrian to be better, to not give into the urge to fester in her own rottenness and resort to snippy comments designed to hurt.

“Okay.” Adrian thinks this over. “Easier said than done. But accepting that you feel this way is a big step. Not punishing yourself for feeling anxious, or killing yourself searching for solutions. But just…letting it sit and coming to terms with it. That you’re not a bad person for feeling these things.”

“It’s been sitting for _eeeever_.” Thea complains. “I just want it out.”

“You always think vomiting things out is the best solution,” Adrian teases fondly. “You know, sometimes it isn’t.”

“Shocker.” Thea squeezes Adrian’s arm, where her own is resting in the crook. “Thanks. You think there’s cookies downstairs?”

“Oh, there better be.”

* * *

It’s nice, to have lazy evenings with Adrian…Thea feels like she clings to them even more when she knows they’re about to head out into the field. They both pilfer the stores and wheedle a meat pie from a bashful servant; sneak back up through the back passages (take that, Josephine's fancy dressmaker!) and sprawl out on the couches chatting, before they both retire for the night full of food and tea.

Thea, who’s managed to keep away from the bottle of whiskey, feels very proud of herself (which…weird, she knows). During these “bad times” it’s not unusual for her to wake up with a hangover for a week straight – though when the cold dawn light hits her in the eyes this morning, it makes no difference if she’s bright-eyed and bushy-tailed or not – she still kind of feels like shit.

As she lies on her stomach and wishes for death (she’s pretty sure there’s a meeting with the advisors this afternoon, they’re going to ask about the missive to Orlais _GOD_ she hates that place), she remembers.

Blackwall.

Thea can see her breath in front of her, cutting across the courtyard. The lamp is lit; the fire is going.

And Blackwall is descending the stairs from the loft when she comes inside, looking incredibly sleepy-eyed and ruffled. He’s missing his gambeson, rumpled in an under tunic and looks almost bashful to be caught by her without his extra padding.

“Put the water on,” he instructs, “I’ll be right back down.”

“Take your time, beauty is pain.” She jokes, hears his laughter floating above her. Her curiosity gets the better of her and after hanging the pot over the flames she peeks over at his worktable.

Laid out neatly on the table are three almost identical horns, a little rough around the edges and obviously hurriedly finished but _very_ similar to what she had sketched out for Blackwall only yesterday.

Wild. This is _wild_. Thea’s heart beats around in her chest as her fingers reach out to touch one of the horns. It’s got that gritty feel of recently sanded wood and when she curls her hand around it the heft is familiar. She was taught to use a horn like this, bending over a client with a flustered, “Sorry, I’m new!”, pressing the horn where she thinks the baby’s shoulders would be in the person's uterus, waiting for that blubbery thumping that was so unlike the loud clear “ _bump bump bump_ ” of the electronic Doppler.

“Is it to your recollection?”

She jumps, turns – Blackwall looks proud of himself, holding her parchment sketch between his two fingers.

“The horns.”

“It’s amazing!” she allows herself to gush, still holding onto one. “ _You're_ amazing, I can’t believe you made _three_ of them in one day - !”

“Well,” Blackwall’s eyes slide briefly to the side in embarrassment. “There were a few duds, so that took up some time. Otherwise I might have had more for you.”

“It’s perfect, you’re amazing.” She repeats, gazing down at it.

“Not sure how well it’ll work.” Blackwall warns, though he looks reluctantly amused at her blabbering. “Didn’t have a baby around to try it out on.”

Oh, that’s something to consider. Thea purses her lips, thinks for a moment.

“Can I listen to _you_?” she asks. “Not the same as a baby but if it conducts sound appropriately I should be able to use it on Leda.”

“…Whatever you need.” Blackwall seems a bit startled, but in her excitement Thea simply moves closer, asks for hurried permission to fold aside his jacket to get to the skin beneath. She can feel Blackwall’s breath stirring the hair on the crown of her head and after a beat she steadies herself on his arm, presses the wider end of the horn against his chest, and puts her ear to it.

Thea jolts backwards so fast she almost drops the horn and loses her balance – it’s only Blackwall’s hand around her arm that stops her pinwheeling backwards, but she doesn’t care about that. She’s looking up at Blackwall, whose face is a mixture of embarrassment and awe.

“You’re a genius!” she yelps, “You did it, you actually did it, you’re amazing dude I could _hear_ you, like – ” she taps out the rhythm of Blackwall’s own heart on his arm (faster than average, maybe it was the walking?), “I can’t believe it, you’ve taken so much stress off me, seriously – ”

With one movement, Blackwall pulls her close, mutters, “Oh, _honestly_ ” and presses a kiss to her mouth.

For a moment, Thea doesn’t move – her stillness doesn’t go unnoticed by Blackwall, who begins to draw back, and she pushes ( _flings_ , really, how embarrassing) her whole body against his chest as she responds, buoyant in the knowledge that Blackwall feels what she feels.

Her hand, clenched around the carved horn, is pressed up against Blackwall’s chest so tight she can feel her knuckles ache. Blackwall’s making a sound in the back of his throat, like a growling groan, and Thea opens up under him, a desperate, unfurling mess. She’s got the fingers of her free hand tangled somewhere between long hair and the beginnings of his beard and Blackwall has the flat of his palm between her shoulder blades, pressing all the air out from between their bodies.

The sound of his tongue against hers is a slick, sensual thing and Thea gasps, “I – ” in lieu of something else (“I want you” “I’m afraid” “I’m less afraid when I’m with you”); but Blackwall groans an answer back, something that vibrates into her chest and sounds like an answer to all three of those at once and instead of continuing Thea just takes a breath and moves back in.

“Hold – hold a moment.” Blackwall finally grunts; the press of his hand on her back turns into a light caress and their bodies and mouths part, just enough to breathe into each other’s spaces.

“This isn’t – we shouldn’t.” he tries, though everything in his face is telling her he wants to put his mouth on her again.

“I know,” she huffs; curls her fingers in his hair and makes no move to release. “Really, uh, really shouldn’t.”

Blackwall’s eyes map her face; then he admits, “I have, however, been wanting to do that for a while.”

“Really?” Thea feels a grin stretch across her face. “Me too. So, then…”

Blackwall lets her plant another kiss on him before he murmurs, “Wouldn’t be right. You’re the Inquisitor.”

“I’m a sham.” She means it as a joke, but it causes Blackwall to fully lean back. His hand grasps the back of her shirt and pulls her in the opposite direction and it shouldn’t be so hot.

“You’re not.” His voice is full of meaning – she feels like she’s missed a plot point.

“I don’t know, I think the people calling me a false Herald are on to something.” From this angle she can see the flecks of gold in his eyes, can see the healed scars from a blow to the eyebrow, a stippled spray of scar tissue where his left sideburn begins.

She deliberates being irresponsible and stealing another kiss; but then huffs and asks, “Did I read you wrong? I thought – I don’t know. I don’t pick up on hints very easily but I thought you were interested.”

“I am,” Blackwall seems quite insistent to let her know that, and his hand remains feather-light on her back. “But this – all of this is bigger than what I want.”

“I don’t think a hole in the sky should stop people from pursuing what they _want_!” Thea tries; she’s starting to feel some insecurity creeping up on her. “But, like, I get it. I’m technically your boss and it’s weird to think about. I just – I like you. I admire what you stand for, and I imagine you have your pick of Skyhold lovers – ”

“Stop that.” Blackwall’s chuckling helplessly, holding up a hand; he can’t quite meet her eyes.

“You outpace them all. You are one of the most capable women I’ve met,” Blackwall says it so sincerely that her protest lodges in her throat. “You face each obstacle in our path with sincere effort. I am glad to know you.”

“Jesus.” Thea breathes, “You can’t _say_ things like that!”

Blackwall chuckles again.

“Why not?” he challenges. “It’s the truth.”

“You don’t – it’s dumb luck,” her protests sound childish and stupid, “What I do, it’s been…thanks to all of you that it seems like I’m capable – ”

“Once is dumb luck,” is Blackwall’s level retort. “Twice is peculiar. But it's been two years, and your luck hasn’t run out. That’s not luck, it’s capability. You sell yourself short.”

She must have a look on her face because Blackwell laughs again – reaches out to cup her face in one broad palm.

“There are many who would let the power go to their head.”

“Oh boy, well.” She thinks about it. “The free drinks in the tavern are nice, I won’t lie.”

He throws his head back, delighted.

“Aye, well, there _is_ that.”

For a moment they stare at each other – Thea feels, for a moment, as if Blackwall has something on the tip of his tongue, something heavy to spill out into the air between them that he’s carried behind his eyes since she met him by the shore of that lake. Thea’s skin prickles with anticipation and she readies herself to be open to whatever comes.

Then she hears her name outside the barn and both their heads turn – the heavy air drops.

“My Lady Inquisitor.” One of Rutherford’s recruits enters the barn, stiff-backed and with that same air of eager sincerity that all those green military newbies seem to possess when they first arrive at Skyhold. “So sorry to disturb but Commander Rutherford wants to meet with you earlier than planned.”

Thea feels her face flatten – Rutherford must _know_ she hates it when he has his summons phrased like a call to the principal’s office. Either that, or he just assumes that’s how people speak to each other.

“Well we _can't_ keep Rutherford waiting.” She snips; Blackwall gives a quiet snort and chides, “Now, careful” in a low voice meant only for her. “I’ll be there shortly. The War Room?”

“Yes, Inquisitor.” The recruit must sense her icy mood because he’s quick to scurry away.

“Try to be patient with the Commander,” Blackwall ribs gently, no real chastising behind his easy tone – after that interruption the practiced ease has come back over his face and he takes several paces back to his worktable to lean over it, “He’s a man who doesn’t think of his words when he has a lot on his mind.”

Thea rolls her eyes in order to hear him laugh; then says, “Alright, well – if you ever want to, you know, pick up where we left off…you know where to find me.”

Blackwall raises his eyebrows at her.

“Shall I send a similar summons?” he gestures to the empty doorway and Thea allows a sly smile to grow across her face.

“I’ll always _come_ when _you_ call, Warden Blackwall.”

She leaves the man spluttering in her wake as she heads back towards the castle, giddy and still flushed from the kiss; and with her new Pinard horn slipped securely into the pocket of her skirt.

(And maybe, Thea thinks deliriously – when she’s extricated herself from the war table, when she’s practically raced down to the tent city; babbled at Leda until the woman lifts up her tunic so she can kneel and press the horn against her belly; when she’s found the heartbeat, made Alyse listen to it to confirm that YES, they can _hear_ the baby strong and fast and happy – maybe she’s okay with letting this sit.

For a little while, anyways.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I feel confident about writing Cole? Not in the least, thank you.


	5. being me can only mean feeling scared to breathe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Write the last chapter," she said. "It'll be SHORT," she said.

Two nights before leaving for the Graves, Thea’s wakefulness comes in a sick jolt, a scrabbling at the blankets. The rap comes again, urgent, and it’s with a stumble that Thea approaches the door.

There’s a trembling young girl standing there, flanked by two of the guards that patrol the corridors outside the Herald’s chambers – across the hall, Thea sees Adrian poking their head out from their cracked open door, face closed off and suspicious.

“Y-Your Worship my name is Melia my cousin is in labour she said to send for you and she said that you asked her to and I promise I was told – ”

“Leda?” Thea croaks, and Melia brightens. She’s got fresh sweat on her brow and a wide, expressive face.

“Yes! Yes. The contractions began this afternoon but they’ve gotten stronger…”

“Okay, okay.” Thea’s wide awake now, says, “W-wait. Wait there. I’m getting dressed.”

“Yes! Your Worship!”

“It’s Thea!” she calls over her shoulder, closes the door and struggles into a tunic, leggings and sweater.

Grabbing the horn Blackwall made for her, Thea straightens her shoulders, does a quick breathing exercise, and opens the door back up.

Adrian’s in the doorway of their room now and the other Herald asks, “You need me, Thea?”

“I always need you.” Is Thea’s immediate response; then, “I don’t – think so, right now. I can do this. I love you. I’ll see you later.”

“Love you. Send for me if you change your mind.” Adrian waits for Thea to close her door; then steps close and gives her the kind of wonderful, full body Adrian hug that Thea just melts against.

“I can do this.” Thea tells them, cupping the join of Adrian’s neck and jaw. Adrian’s expression softens – Thea can see the years of pain and acceptance and _power_ behind her friend’s gaze.

“You can do this.” They affirm. “I know you can. Tell me about it later.”

“Blow by blow.” Thea murmurs, squeezes, then parts.

Turning to Melia, she asks, “Will you take me to Leda?”

“Of course, Your Worship!”

Here’s the thing – Thea’s always felt like an imposter. Her whole life, she’s been convinced that she’s just been stumbling upon the right answers. Just funny enough to have a personality. Just sincere enough to be a “good friend”. Just tall enough to have a figure. Just wide-eyed enough for a “pretty face”. Just smart enough to coast. Three years into her degree, Thea had been convinced she’d gotten through the program with lucky guesses. Every compliment to her talent felt empty. Every attribute was misplaced and overblown. No one knew who she really was: a scared scrabbling, stupid thing in the dark.

In Thedas that hasn’t changed – in fact, with the knowledge that she can _push_ suggestions onto people, it’s honestly gotten worse. Why would Thea believe in herself when people believe in her because she can _make_ them? Because she held a shiny sword upright in front of a crowd, because she stands beside someone Thea believes is leaps and bounds a better person than she could ever be; because she’s surrounded by people who _believe_ and _fight_ so fiercely that Thea is lumped in with them out of habit?

And look where it’s gotten her. A child fetching her in the dead of night because someone else thinks of Thea as _capable_. What a joke. Thea clenches the Pinard horn, tries to remember Blackwall’s earnest words to her character. Fails miserably.

What a joke. Adrian looks at her with such easy confidence. How can Thea tell them that they’ve made a _mistake_?

 _Everyone's_ made a fucking mistake about her. Cassandra would have chosen to leave her in that wreckage if her hand hadn’t crackled with energy; if she hadn’t been of some _use_ to Adrian in that harried, awful time.

The tears don’t fall – Thea won’t let them. Tears are for after the baby’s here, not before. In the dark of the courtyard, keeping pace with the skittering frantic Melia who babbles a summary of the afternoon’s labour, Thea instead squeezes her eyes shut and thinks with a tinge of malice:

_If I’ve ever fucking wanted you here, Cole, now’s the GODDAMN TIME!!!!_

There’s a displacement of air; she opens her eyes when Melia shrieks.

“Hey.” Thea croaks again, as Cole’s pale watery eyes find hers in the weak light of the torches lit amongst the tent city. “You ever delivered a baby?”

Cole cocks his head – his long legs outpace hers and Thea increases her speed out of spite.

“Is that what we’re doing?” he asks, voice soft.

Thea feels instant guilt. Cole never asked for this – actually, from what she knows about him from Solas, he never really asked for _any_ of this.

“It’s what _I'm_ doing.” She responds, gentling her tone to match his. “I’m sorry. If you don’t want to, I won’t make you.”

Cole makes a tuneless, flat hum in his throat, like he did when Blackwall showed up that day with Leda; says nothing, but slows to keep a more manageable pace.

Behind them, Melia huffs, “I-is this your attendant?”

“Oh, this is my friend.” Thea says without thinking. “Cole. He’s great. Melia, sorry, do we turn left - ?”

It’s a funny thing – the smell of _birth_ never leaves her. It’s earthy – it’s _shit_ honestly (literally more than figuratively). Thea deliriously feels like she can smell that Leda’s fully dilated before she even steps fully into the tent. The fire is going and casting long, flickering shadows across the cots. There are other people there (the tent holds close to a dozen people), with some younger children. Some look like they’re sleeping while others are soothing their children. Alyse is by the fire, stoking it. Any talking is hushed, broken by Leda’s low, throaty moans of pain.

“Melia, will you gather some hot water and some cloths? And rags, if you have them.” Thea levels a look at Cole.

“Do you want to help me?”

Cole is stiff-backed, like he too is smelling the air; his eyes are fixed to the left of Leda, who is squatting in the centre of the tent and supported by a man Thea assumes is her husband; and he is muttering.

Without thinking, Thea slips her hand into Cole’s. If anything, she _knows_ the stiff-backed fear that comes with observing labour. That’s what she was like for most of her training.

“Can you hold a towel and rub the baby’s back when it comes out?” she asks him.

Cole finally slides his eyes around and holds her gaze. His hand doesn’t close to grasp hers but he doesn’t pull away.

“Yes.” He breathes. She taps the inside of his cold, limp hand once, twice.

“Alright, good. With me, Cole.

“Leda, you’re amazing.” She enthuses as she struggles out of her sweater and rolls her sleeves up. “Do you feel like you need to push?”

She can see Alyse at the fire, helping Melia with what looks like that hot water Thea asked for.

“Yes.” Leda exhales – her head is tilted back, recovering from a contraction, and the line of her back is taut and tense. Thea can see the purple line indicative of labour progress running from the cleft of her ass upwards towards her sacrum.

“Hi, it’s Thea by the way.” She murmurs from behind. “I’m just going to take a look under you, alright? You’re doing great. If you feel like you need to push, just _do_ it.”

Almost on her back, Thea extends her body under to confirm – with the next contraction, she can see something fleshy ( _not a head_ ) start to displace the lips of Leda’s labia.

Well. It might be too late to waste practice time on the Pinard horn, then!

“Hey, Leda, I can see your baby.” Thea says. “I think he’s breech like I thought. I might need your patience.”

Leda lets out a pained whimper – Thea sees her fingers, white, clenching on her husband’s arms.

“Oh hey,” Thea says, still half under Leda. “You’re Leda’s husband?”

“Yes.” He says, startled at their proximity. “Callum.”

“Callum, hey, keep doing that, that’s great. Tell your wife how amazing she is.” Thea withdraws, puts her palms on Leda’s hips. “Next contraction, I’m gonna squeeze and we’ll see if that helps.”

She squeezes through the next contraction, watches Leda’s labia for movement. The baby is descending, displacing, causing movement – Thea is bolstered by the progress. For a moment, the anxiety leaves her – is replaced with adrenaline, with the need to take _care_ of things.

“Cole, I’m going to go grab some things.” She tells the spirit, who is knelt beside her. “You watch her perineum. You _tell_ me if it bulges. You keep your _eye_ on that perineum Cole, you promise?”

She tells herself this is payback for all the inappropriate thought sharing Cole has been doing lately – but she still feels guilty when Cole gives a shuddering nod. His lips are still moving, in a perpetual mutter, though Thea cannot hear what he has to say.

 _In many things, the journey of death is similar to the journey of birth_ , Solas had said about Cole. Thea wonders which journey Cole is dictating now.

That’s a bad thought. Thea wipes that bad thought out by accepting the basin of water from Melia and snatching a cloth from the hot water, wringing it and instructing Cole where to place it as Leda’s labia displace with the baby’s descent.

After the next contraction, Thea doubles back to speak with Alyse, who walks her through the afternoon – Leda has been walking around the tent for most of the afternoon, supported by her husband; she slept a bit in the early part of labour and has been eating dried fruit and drinking a leaf tea Alyse drank during her own labour. Leda’s waters (clear) went only an hour or so ago and there’s been good, bloody show throughout.

Thea ends up using the horn a few times over the next half hour, after each contraction to soothe her own fears – taps her finger on her own thigh to show that baby’s heart is fast. No decelerations that she can hear. Perfect.

Alyse lets out an exhale behind them – when Thea lifts her ear off the horn she realizes that with this next contraction the baby’s backside has begun to protrude from Leda, covered in thick white, cheesy vernix.

“Okay, take your breath! Don’t fight it, let it come.” Thea instructs as Leda groans; the woman listens, because Thea can do nothing but move to crouch behind her and watch the lower half of the baby slowly slide out, slow to move. Thea has to remember that’s _normal_.

“Hang ten.” Thea tells herself, crawling under Cole as he continues to press the cloth against Leda’s perineum. Their eyes meet – Cole looks curious, blankly interested. His hand is steady, not shaking like Thea’s are as she hovers them on either side of the baby’s rump, descending out of Leda’s body.

“Herald, take hold of him.” Alyse insists, but Thea shakes her head.

“If I grab his body and jostle him too much, he might try to breathe while he’s still inside,” she murmurs, shuffles her shoulders down a little as the baby’s torso sinks further out into the air. “I won’t let him fall, I promise.”

Cole is bent overtop her, still murmuring.

“All good, you can take the cloth off now,” she tells him, reaching back to touch his knee. “Can you get a blanket ready?”

As Cole moves to obey, Thea takes her thumbs, presses them to the back of the thighs that have appeared in her line of vision.

They taught this in emergency skills but Thea’s never _used_ it – it’s a whole surprise when the baby’s legs spring out from the force of her fingers, bringing with them a gush of fluid and blood.

Thea curls like she’s doing a crunch, avoiding most of the mess – Leda wails from the sensation.

“Leda, your baby’s half out!” Thea tells her, voice betraying her trembling excitement. “You’re so close – just one more push with that next contraction, I bet you could get him out here and say happy birthday!”

Leda’s weeping and in a series of jerky, painful movements she clambers to stand, bent over at the waist and still supported by her husband; Thea sees her legs trembling, her heels lifting with the sensation of a whole human being sitting so close to the outside. With another wave, the baby’s body descends further, dangling between Thea’s outstretched hands. Thea’s sitting up now, heart pounding in her throat. She can see the umbilical cord, shiny and plump with blood, stretched taut against the baby’s stomach as it dangles down to its nipples. The cord disappears up into Leda’s body.

Little elbows emerge – Thea closes her eyes, thinks _If ever there’s time to push a prayer, this baby WILL come out screaming and alive!_ And squishes her thumbs into the baby’s elbows.

“If ever there’s time to push a prayer” Cole repeats. “Like a begging like a wish like a moth in the dark that no one can see except the one that feels it pass by – ”

“Oh my _God_ , _Cole_ , c’mon!” Thea groans as the baby’s arms loosen – suddenly, it’s just the head that remains inside.

Leda’s screaming – “ ** _I want it out!!!!!!!_** ”

“When _ever_ you’re ready, lemme see his beautiful face!” Thea proclaims, pushes her protesting body so she’s jackknifed up behind Leda and supporting with her hands under the baby’s backside.

The sight of that baby’s face pushing out of his mother doesn’t ever leave her mind, her whole time in Thedas.

With a breathless, “Reach down and grab your baby!” Thea palms the back of the baby’s neck and helps bring the baby up through Leda’s thighs and onto her naked chest; scoots on her backside around to the side to help steady the baby as Leda gets guided down to sprawl on the ground. As soon as she does, Cole is there (judging by Callum’s startled jump, probably in that supernatural way of his), rubs the cloth once, twice, reverentially until Thea prompts, “Fast, Cole, make sure baby boy is screaming on his birthday!”

One more harsh rub; and the baby’s squawling, cheek squashed against his mother’s breast. Leda sobs out a happy wail; then Thea’s rolling towards Cole out of the way so Callum can sink down and embrace his wife and newborn son.

Baby is pink, flexing his limbs, and crying – a solid 3 out of 3. It’s the best outcome Thea could have ever hoped for without resuscitation equipment handy.

Thea doesn’t realize she’s crying until she feels the wetness on her face, a release of relief and happiness. Cole doesn’t embrace her – she’s not really sure he knows about the concept of “friendly comfort” but he’s still murmuring the thoughts of Leda, of Callum, of Alyse, and Thea pats his arm.

“Some things are supposed to be kept to one’s self.” She reminds gently, rolls up into a better seated position.

Leda and Callum and baby stay like that for a while – eventually Leda’s wet eyes turn to her.

“Told you I was paranoid.” Thea tries with a weak smile. “You were just fine, in the end. Barely even needed to be here.”

“Oh, Herald.” Leda reaches out a shivering arm, and Thea takes it, squeezes her hand.

“You did all the work, oh my God.” Thea enthuses. “That was amazing. You worked _so_ hard.”

“Th-thank you for being here.” Leda tries and as Thea splutters Alyse kneels behind her and Cole, squeezes her shoulders and says, “You’ll stay for a drink, won’t you?”

“Yeah, _absolutely_ – ” Thea groans, busy ripping several strips off some of the rags so she can tie off the umbilical cord. She’s just seen a gush of blood, the placenta’s coming soon.

Alyse fills two mugs with a cloudy, home-brewed liquor that fills her nose and _rages_ on the way down. Thea sips it all through the birth of the placenta, through sending for a healer for some coagulating herbs; through stoking the fire for more tea and lending her dagger to Callum and Leda so they can cut the umbilical cord between the two strips of rags Thea’s tied on. Thea finds this part a relief, flitting around Leda and Callum and baby as they eventually convince Leda to move to the cot, sponge her off with warm rags so she can curl up under a blanket and be fed by her husband. Thea keeps an eye on the bleeding, apologetically explains fundal massages to Leda before firmly pressing down on the top of the uterus. There are a few clots but the healer gets the herbs brewed and fed to Leda in a tea and there’s nothing else that worries her. Baby is pink, sleepy on the breast until he stirs and starts to root. Alyse firmly commands Thea to “sit and drink” and joins her sister to help with the latch.

Alyse’s toddler sleeps through it all. The other families in the tent are moving in the dark, gathering blankets or murmuring congratulations. Some lie down and go back to sleep in the muffled pre-dawn stillness.

It’s unreal to see. Thea remembers many of her placements being full of tension – uncertainty about birthing out of hospital; the mechanical sounds of hospital equipment and the anxiety of clients worried about their babies and needing that control over their bodies during a time where so many things were out of control. Seeing it take place here, in a dim tent surrounded by the bubble of conversation and sleepy noises, a million worlds away from any technology that would have helped (or hindered) her…is oddly reassuring.

Cole whispers, “I don’t want this”, tries to push his mug under her knees.

“Not even a sip for a toast?” she asks; at his look, she says, “A toast. We clink our cups together to say congratulations. _We helped a baby be born, Cole_.”

Cole holds her eyes – the mug comes up, briefly, to ‘clink’ against hers so quietly the rims barely touched. Then he puts the mug back under her knees.

Thea laughs, lifts the mug and chirps, “To your goddamn health dude, _shit_ ” and takes a drink to stop the bubbling hysteria in her throat.

Her heart doesn’t stop hammering but there’s a sense of calm that overtakes her in the dark. Cole remains at her side, an eerily silent presence – for once, he doesn’t voice any of her thoughts.

Though that may be because for once, the thoughts aren’t as loud. They slide around her brain and to the back of her mind, percolate in the fuzzy stillness of knowing that the baby is earthside – that throughout this _mess_ , this absolute horrendous clusterfuck of misery and pain that Thea and Adrian wade through on a daily basis, the cycles of life continue to move.

Resting her chin on her knees, Thea watches Leda and her family bask in the afterglow.

Cole mirrors her, chin on his knees and she reaches out to pat him on the shin.

“You should become a midwife, Cole.” She tells him. “You were great.”

Another tuneless hum – she wonders if that’s Cole’s way of telling her “not funny”. It’s kind of endearing.

Two hours after the birth, it’s almost dawn – it feels strange to stay, when the mood becomes quiet and even more intimate so Thea wanders over to the cot to say goodbye.

“I leave for the Emerald Graves in two – oh, I guess tomorrow now.” She says a little woozily. “But if you’re still here when I’m back I’ll check in on you. Congratulations.”

“Thank you for being here.” Leda says again – her eyes can’t seem to leave her child.

“Do you have a name for him?” she can feel Cole at her back, peeking curiously over her shoulder at the baby as he suckles intermittently at his mother’s breast.

“Vincent.” Callum says from the other side of the bed.

“Vincent.” Thea repeats, smiles. “That’s lovely. I wish you all so much happiness. It was a real honour.”

“The honour was mine!” Leda splutters happily but Thea’s already waving her off, moving to the fire to say goodbye to Melia and Alyse, who are preparing what looks like breakfast.

“You surprised me, Inquisitor.” Alyse admits, giving her a firm handshake after Thea refuses the offer of staying for food. “I didn’t think you’d come. Not a lot of military leaders would do what you did.”

“I’m really more of a figurehead.” Thea balks at the assumption, then adds, “A lot of us in the Inquisition were other things before…before this. I’ve spent most of my time here feeling like I was in a role I wasn’t meant for. Just for a morning, it was nice to feel useful.”

Alyse examines her. “Useful!” she muses. “The Inquisitor is useful enough for most!”

“Inquisitor should and _will_ be a temporary title,” Thea replies, a bit of firmness to her tone. “Only for the darkest times, if at all. I want to be useful after all this is over, too. Thanks for helping me see that.”

Looking over at Melia, she adds, “Also. Excellent fetching skills, Melia. I felt very cared for.”

Melia turns red. “Your Worship!”

“ _Please_ stop with that.”

Alyse’s face is thoughtful and she says, “Best of luck to you, Inquisitor. We’re all counting on you.”

“I’ll try my best!” Thea tugs on Cole’s tunic, and Alyse turns to thank him as well. Cole looks like he’s about to say something – maybe about Alyse’s deep seated fears? The night is young – but doesn’t.

Actually, he doesn’t speak until they’re almost across the courtyard to the tavern, when Thea realizes she’s walking Cole home even though she doesn’t know if Cole has a _room_ somewhere or even if he _sleeps_ or –

“It’s _real_ now.” Cole looks wondrous when she turns to look at him. Thea wonders just what she’s unleashed.

“It _is_ real.” She insists, though she’s spent most of her time in Thedas convincing herself that these people don’t exist, that this is a bad dream she’ll wake up from eventually.

“It _is_ real.” Cole echoes back to her. “This place. What people fight for. She mourns for her brother but she believes in what we do. He left a city he was happy in, but he still wants to help. He slept for so long…why wake up for this? You are the eye of the storm, they look to the Heralds...it’s real now, you can’t leave.”

“Jesus Christ.” Thea huffs, looking at Cole; then says, “You know, I don’t like hearing my thoughts on the outside. It’s weird. It’s unnerving. I get why you do it. But I don’t like it. For the record.”

“Yes.” That’s probably the closest to a conversation about boundaries that Thea’s going to get right now.

“Thanks for being with me.” She says sincerely, lingering in the courtyard with the spirit. “It was a comfort. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t understand about who you are or what you’re doing here, but I treated you poorly when we first met. I’m sorry.”

Cole doesn’t say anything – then reaches out and taps his fingers against the inside of her palm, like she did to him earlier. Thea, stupidly, feels her heart swell.

“I gotta go – you know what, not sure if I’m going to sleep but I at least have to lie down.” She tells him. “I’ll see you later?”

“I think so.” Cole says – when she shifts her eyes again, he’s gone.

Never mind, okay, he was starting to get a bit adorable but it’s back to spooky.

* * *

Thea remembers _this_ from home, too. That bone-tiredness of witnessing a birth coupled with leftover adrenaline that has her eyelids sagging and her pulse thrumming at the same time. Back home she would have had a beer, laid on her floor, and thought about what she did right (or wrong). Here, she lies on the couch in the common area, staring at the ceiling until the sun rises and she feels less guilty about calling for some hot water for a bath. While she waits she jots notes – commits her actions to memory, reviews what she did and how it felt to perform those emergency skills for the first time.

She’s soaking in the tub in her room with the whiskey bottle close at hand when Adrian knocks.

“Are you alive?” they ask through the door.

“Come in, oh my God Ade.” Thea croaks – her voice feels blasted. She sits up in the bath to drag the privacy screen across the majority of the bathtub but she leaves a little bit open to see her friend enter. Thea is well versed in platonic nudity but she knows Adrian isn’t quite as comfortable, and this is her compromise.

“Hey, oh, is the whiskey a _good_ sign or - ?” Adrian looks torn between wanting to know and _not_ wanting to know, and breathlessly Thea launches into a recap of the night, babbling out vocabulary and backtracking when Adrian looks confused. Her friend ends up sitting cross-legged on the floor while Thea hangs over the lip of the bath.

“That’s amazing.” Adrian’s smiling up at her; then says, “Wait, did you say _Cole_ \- ?”

Thea starts laughing, her voice pitched hysterical.

“I never thought,” she whimpers on the edge of a laugh, “That _Cole_ would be _holding a rag_ near someone’s _genitalia_ in my _life_.”

Adrian has their eyes closed.

“I really – I just really don’t want to think about it.” They laugh. “Honestly.”

“Totally fair.” Thea murmurs, propping her chin on the tub’s edge.

“So? How do you feel?” Adrian prompts.

“Amazing. Horrible. Like I could run a marathon. Like I want to sleep for a million years. Like I wanna punch Corypheus straight in his stupid rotten face.”

“I’m always down for that.” Is Adrian’s immediate response; then they smile. “You feel better.”

“I feel better.” Thea exhales. “Oh my _God_. So much better. You know I was having dreams about the baby, like, hitting the floor? Coming out and dying instantly? Leda exploding?”

“I highly doubt that.”

“You can highly doubt whatever you want.”

Adrian props themselves up with their hands on their thighs.

“You did really well.” They tell Thea. “I’m proud of you.”

“I’m going to cry.” Thea tells her – which is a lie because she’s already crying.

“Aww, yup.” Adrian scootches closer to squeeze Thea’s outstretched hand – Thea thoughtfully hunches so she squishes her breasts away from view.

Compromise.

“I really am – uh. Grateful. That it happened while I was here. That I got to…remember that I’m not an awful midwife.”

Adrian levels her with a look. Fair.

“Which I’m not, but it was a fear. Especially with everything going on.”

Thea takes a breath. “It was nice, you know? To feel useful for something other than…”

She waves her glowy hand.

A shadow of recognition passes across Adrian’s face; then they nod.

“I get it.”

Thea _knows_ Adrian gets it, knows her friend has cultivated their own skills and interests here in Skyhold. Sometimes it’s nice to have someone praise them on a job well done that doesn’t involve closing Rifts.

They sit together for a few minutes more, as the dawn light gets stronger; Thea’s eyes start stinging from fatigue and Adrian suggests she goes to bed, but even the heat of the water isn’t bringing Thea down from the high and she puts off the suggestion in favour of cramming a few biscuits into her mouth that Adrian sends for from the kitchens.

As such, Thea doesn’t _really_ sleep much before they leave for the Emerald Graves – barely has time to clamber out of the _bath_ , actually, before they’re set upon with a massive to do list: finalizing packing, meeting with Leliana about possible contacts in the Graves; checking over their own packs (neither Adrian nor Thea will allow any servants to pack for them– it’s a ritual and a reassurance all in one); meeting with Solas (who is accompanying them) to discuss the history of the Graves so they’re prepared. Adrian asks questions, Thea takes shorthand and interjects when needed.

Then she goes to Varric’s table, puts her head down and dozes for fifteen minutes before she has to go look over the mounts and take down her saddle and tack in preparation for the morning.

So she’s a little dizzy with fatigue when she slips away from Adrian’s side after a meeting with Josephine and clomps down the stairs of the castle to head towards the barn.

Blackwall is up in the loft, though he responds to her greeting when she calls up to him. The last of the cots have been emptied out from the clinic and Blackwall’s workstation has been rearranged properly once more.

“I am here to report,” she announces when Blackwall’s halfway down the stairs, “That your horn was a success.”

“Oh, really?” Blackwall looks curious, if not a touch proud. “Did you manage to attend the birth after all?”

Thea eagerly gives him a summary of the morning’s events – the frenetic energy that’s been building in her body all day has her winding her fingers in her tunic front as she speaks and Blackwall watches her with that practiced, thoughtful eye.

“And you disapproved of me singing your praises among the refugees.” He smiles at her – his tone is teasing but he sounds surprisingly genuine. “Well done, Inquisitor. She was in good hands.”

“It all worked out.” Thea agrees; her hands are trembling a little when she stills her fingers. “I’ve been thinking about you. About, uh, the last time we spoke.”

Blackwall stills near the worktable, and though his body language is attentive he takes a long moment to speak.

“I know,” he takes a breath. “I don’t – think it’s a good idea. Surely you feel the same.”

“No.” she replies. “Maybe I did, before. I think that’s why I waited so long to say something to you. Is it really so bad? To try to find happiness even if everything else in the world is going to shit?”

She’d asked herself that, too, and her answer had changed dramatically over the week. She was hoping his would, too.

“I spent so much time here thinking it wasn’t real. That I wasn’t real.” She continues, taking a step forward. The barn’s deserted; Blackwall holds himself like he’s ready to accept any rejection she can throw at him.

“But I _am_ real,” she insists – when she reaches out, he takes her hand instantly, squeezes hard. It calms the trembling. “ _You're_ real. And you make me want to be better, to be a better person. A better leader. You’ve always been so certain about who you are. I want to know that kind of person. I want to know _you_.”

“Thea – ” Blackwall’s eyes are suddenly wild and afraid, like she’s cornered an animal. It’s only later that she realizes it’s the first time he’s called her by her given name.

Thea dogs the subject, just a little – she just helped catch a _baby_ , after all.

“Can we speak? After I’m back,” she squeezes his hand when he makes to pull away. “There’s so much I want to say. So much I want to tell you. So much I want to try, if you’ll have me.”

“I’m not the man you think I am.” The sentence bursts out of Blackwall like a broken dam. Thea smiles with relief.

“I’ve spent so long thinking I wasn’t a worthy person. Of power. Of affection. I didn’t recognize the person I saw reflected back to me through other people. This is the first time I’ve ever thought myself capable. And I _know_ you are capable, and deserving, Blackwall. I admire you. I’ve always admired you, the things you fight for. The way you believe in us. The way you laugh in the tavern, even. It’s stupid. _I'm_ stupid. But if you’ll have me, it’ll all be worth it.”

When Blackwall doesn’t answer – just clings to her hand like he’s drowning – she steps away, arm extended, assures, “I don’t want an answer, at least not now. I’m a little drunk on adrenaline, and I also haven’t slept. I want to do this proper. So. That’s why I’m asking. Can we speak when I’m back?”

“I – ” Blackwall squeezes once, twice, then releases her hand. “It may not be the answer you’re looking for.”

“That’s alright.” Thea tells him, feeling a spreading calm (or is that the next stage of sleeplessness?) across her body. “If you can’t return my feelings. I won’t hold it against you. But I just had to say it, before I left. You can give me your answer when I’m back. Take care, Blackwall.”

“Take care, Inquisitor.” Blackwall’s voice comes out strangled; after a beat, he reaches again for her hand and pulls her into a quick, fervent kiss.

“What if you’re making a mistake?” he asks against the corner of her lips, before withdrawing.

“What if I’m not?” she responds, standing toe-to-toe with him. “It’s okay if you think I am. Just tell me no when I come back, okay?”

“I don’t know if I can.”

With a huff, Thea cups his face.

“Try to be honest.” She prompts him. “I don’t – I can’t offer much to you, though. I don’t have like…a dowry, or a good family name – ”

She’s snickering before she even finishes the sentence and Blackwall’s laughing too, like he’s releasing a buildup from inside himself, leaning into her touch and pressing their foreheads together.

“What a pair we make, then.” He chuckles into her exhale. “Two paupers with barely a name between us.”

Later, much later, Thea will fixate on this statement; fixate on this _lie_ , perhaps the worst among them that Blackwall ever fed her (fed _them_ , fed the Inquisition) because it’s the one he didn’t need to _say_.

(She will keep this from Adrian, even though it’s the lie that makes the sorrow bubble from her lips relentlessly, face down on the couch of their quarters as Adrian rubs her back and growls, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’ll _kill_ him – ”)

For now, though, she pulls back and insists, “Tell me you’ll save a mug of potch for me when I’m back. Promise me we’ll at least talk?”

“I could never deny you that.” Blackwall’s voice is hoarse and in that moment he looks equal parts horrified and hopeful. Stupidly, at the time, Thea focuses on the hope – assumes he is grappling with the same feelings that she is.

“Okay. Then. We’ll talk. I’ll see you soon.” Thea stands there, nods; when he nods back, she turns and walks towards the barn door.

“Be safe, Thea.” The statement slows her steps and she glances over her shoulder.

In the morning light, again, Blackwall is at his best. Warm-eyed, hands soft around his woodworking tools, chest open from where she’d previously been nestled.

“You too.”

She means it, carries the lilt of her name on his tongue through the Emerald Graves with her, until she’s safely back through Skyhold’s gates two months later.

The euphoria doesn’t last for long – nothing good ever does, it seems, in Thedas.

But it was delicious while it lasted.

* * *

When she returns from the Graves, Leda and her family have moved on from Skyhold – but a year later, a parcel is sent to Skyhold from a village in southern Ferelden. It contains a locket with a light brown baby-hair curl in it and a note from Leda.

“ _Word of the Midwife of Andraste has spread even to our little home,_ ” the note reads. “ _Our Vincent will grow up knowing that the Maker was with him at his birth. Please keep him with you, as we will you._ ”

“’The Midwife of Andraste’ where do these people come _up_ with these names?” Thea will complain through emotional tears to Adrian – but she’ll keep the locket on her until they face Corypheus for the last time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy is foreshadowing a bitch (I love it).
> 
> In Canada, at least, midwives are taught how to deliver breech babies in an emergency (if there is no time to transfer to a hospital or perform a c-section) – but usually breech babies are c-sectioned and there are very few practitioners in the country who offer vaginal breech births. 
> 
> Birth is something that still makes me so nervous – I know that’s a side effect of the medicalization of birth (AND of still being a student), but it is still such an intense experience that puts the pregnant person through a rollercoaster of pain and emotion that is a LOT to witness. Just thinking about attending a birth in the fantasy equivalent of the Middle Ages (?with some anachronistic tech thrown in there for good measure) gives me nervous sweats. So in a way, this was cathartic! Thanks for seeing this through to the end. 
> 
> Any other stories I write about Thea and Adrian will be anachronistic and probably not too serious. It's easier for me to drop into the middle of things, though I do like seeing how the relationships between Inquisitors and their Inner Circles build from Haven, so who knows.


End file.
